The Battle for the One, True ‘Fire Cider’ (Published 2019) (2024)

Fire cider is an herbal concoction that steeps for weeks and emerges tangy and hot. It is a pungent brew made from apple cider vinegar, onions, garlic and horseradish, sometimes with citrus and hot peppers thrown in. Proponents claim it has beneficial properties.

Lately fire cider has become known for another property: its ability to electrify the typically serene herbalist community. The contentious tonic is the subject of a lawsuit filed in Massachusetts that, when it goes to trial this month, will pit timeworn traditions against cold, hard capitalism. The question to be answered in court: Who has the right to sell fire cider — and still call it “fire cider”?

The conflict began in 2012, when a Massachusetts company called Shire City Herbals trademarked the name of its signature drink, which comes in three flavors and is now carried in all 50 states. Dana St. Pierre, 40, who founded the company with his wife and brother-in-law, said he learned the basics of making fire cider from his German grandmother, a medical skeptic who often relied on home remedies.

Mr. St. Pierre said that he tinkered with her recipe for decades, adding habanero peppers and lemons for kick, steeping the brew for four weeks at a time, until it tasted just right. According to his version of events, he came up with the name “fire cider” and around 2010, began selling it at local craft fairs and farmers markets. Soon after, on the advice of a customer, he trademarked the brand name to protect his small family business from being copied by larger companies.

But herbalists from around the country say they have been making and selling fire cider for decades, long before Shire City Herbals even existed. Many trace the term’s use to a 1980s home study course by Rosemary Gladstar, a woman known as a “godmother of modern herbalism” who runs an herbal retreat center in Vermont.

“This is a warming, decongesting tonic and/or medicine that can be taken daily,” Ms. Gladstar wrote under the heading “Fire Cider” in a self-published booklet from the late 1980s. She listed horseradish, garlic, onion, ginger, cayenne, honey and apple cider vinegar as necessary ingredients for the mix. Her book, “Rosemary Gladstar’s Herbs for the Home Medicine Chest” (1999), also contained the recipe. If a cold is coming on, she advised, “Take 1 tsp. every half-hour or as often as needed.”