Blake’s Orchard & Cider Mill

I’m not going to review the activities and stuff within the Orchard. Everyone knows what fatty donuts and sugary cider tastes like, and that’s all well and good.
I’m going to talk about the bar section, because I’m a childless adult in his 20’s and I’ve got nothing else going for me, but alcohol. And gaddamn they got some good alcohol. They got every flavor apple and then put some other stuff into their ciders too. They had a spicy one, a sweet one, a dry one. All of them were reasonably priced and the service was smiling the whole time.
I would recommend this place all year round and not just in the fall when you you see women wearing a flannel shirt, puffy vest, skinny jeans, and a pair of boots to their knees. You know what I’m talking about. It’s like the time of year these women want to parade around in their new gear, and this is the place they all collect to show each other who wears the same thing best. I’m not complaining though,

Well worth the drive! We came for our first time to buy a Christmas tree only to find out that they offer all sorts of yummy treats and activities all year round. The hard cider is my fav and the fact that you now sell it in some stores locally makes me one happy gal! You’ll be seeing lots more of us :) Cant wait to sample it all!

I’ve been going to Blake’s for quite a few years. My family and I enjoy this place for their awesome cider and donuts. I’ve always loved watching the apple press in the barn too. We’ve had some great memories here. Blake’s has shown their resilience over the years with tremendous upgrades to the farm. They’ve opened a bar where they serve up some hard cider. They’ve added a couple new buildings (e.g. café) to really spread the space out. Over the years, Blakes has gone from crowded (during peak times) to crowded with more shoulder room. It’s a nice place to take the family.
This is also the location where we like to cut down our own Christmas tree. It’s been a tradition for my family and I for a decade. I’ve never had an issue with the trees until the last couple of years. Since Blake’s has been growing, their tree farm has not. Last year we were able to get a decent tree after scouring the farm for what seemed like hours. This year, all of the trees in the lot (Frasier fur) were just about 6 feet tall on the high end. All of the trees were well picked over and I was extremely disappointed in the selection. The price was still the same, though, even for a smaller tree ($ 70).
I really like Blake’s. It’s unfortunate they can’t keep up with the demand. I’d recommend going here for a Christmas tree, but wait about 4 years when their younger trees mature. Oh, but if You can settle for a pre-​cut tree, they have a ton to choose from. I will be seeking another resource with less traffic during the holidays.
–strik934

Went here in the middle of September for apple picking. It was fun! Tons of apples as well as fresh veggies (cabbage, string beans). We also went to the cider mill to try their hard cider! I got a flight ($ 9) which allows you to sample (~5oz) three different hard ciders. They also have flights for wine as well. Would defiately go again!

Christmas trees. Hot cider. Hot coffee. Fresh donuts. Awesome store full of local stuff. Had a great time with the family.

Love blakes! For $ 11.50 it includes TONS of things for the kids to do! Hayrides, train rides, animals, play grounds, bikes, corn maze, hay maze, jumping pillows, kids haunted house and more! My 7 and 10’yr olds loved it and so did I and my mom. Their donuts are some of the best I’ve ever had… and we went took some hard cider home to try. Can’t wait to go again next year! Hoping to make a visit with just my husband and I to thank you more of the wine and cider.

We made the trip out to Blakes on 10−11−15 and this place is unreal. There was a car show across the street so parking was a real serious problem, even at 10:00 am. This w is the only reason for a 4 out of 5.
Their facilities are setup to handle a large amount of people. I truly enjoyed being able to watch them press the cider as I was standing in line to order. I grew up in PA and we had an orchard and pressed our own cider. Blakes is really good cider, as good as we ever made. They have a large mix of apple varieties and have a lot of older hard to find varieties like the Northern spy and courtland. The smaller apples that don’t make the grade for commercial sale get ground for cider. It sucks paying $ 8.50 a gallon for cider, we sold it for $ 2.50 a gallon in the 80’s, but that’s inflation. Having personally made thousands of gallons and consumed hundreds of gallons in my youth, I give Blakes a 5 out of 5 on the Cider.
They didn’t have any Northern spy’s available inside, so I took the girlfriend on a you pick adventure. The orchards are well maintained, good parking and easy picking. The trees are dwarf variety and the apples can be picked from the ground. We picked a ½ bushel of Northern Spy.
It is nice to see an Orchard business thrive as they have. I didn’t mind paying a little more for quality and I will be back in the future.

Blake’s has a great haunted hayride and kids attractions! The cider and doughnuts are good too. I just wish the prices for the cider was lower.

Beautiful fall day, so let’s go to Blakes. If you do prepare to give up your arm and leg to pay for everything. A half gallon of cider, 6 donuts for $ 8, 11.50 per person including adults, insane parking lots almost not worth coming here anymore.
Our kids are older and seriously are bored.

They need a better system for Growlers, I purchased 4, 2 of them leaked, 1 we had the other went flat :((

This place brings back many memories from my childhood. Love the smell of the fresh cooked donuts. The place has really grown over the years! We visited the cider mill first. Great cider and donuts! We grabbed caramel apples to go. Great prices on it all. Then we visited the winery. Got a couple flights to try the ciders and wines. The blueberry wine and el chavo were our personal favorites. Did not visit the petting zoo. It doesn’t have the same appeal to me now as it did when I was a kid. And I didn’t feel worth, $ 9. Expect to spend a little cash, but overall great experience!

A+ to the cider and winery interior
A to the cider mill as a whole
A– to the food in the restaurant
A+ to the happy hour deals
B for the cider
The interior of the cider and winery looks awesome and perfectly matches what they’re going for.
The food menu is the same way, the options are awesome. Maybe a few more options. And a little more consistent.
Few complaints about the cider mill as a whole. Fairly priced.
I want desperately to love their ciders. But they’re all too dry. I think they need like one or two more sweet ones. I’m not looking for angry orchard flavor necessarily, but a little less dry. I feel they almost all taste the same. The el Chavo is wicked good though. A perfect amount of spice, at least for my preference.
All in all. This place is awesome: the ambiance perfectly fits the mood, the food and deals are good, I just want a more varying cider menu. If they get a couple more sweet, crisp ciders, this place would easily grab a 5 star from this guy.

The Beau and I stopped by Blake’s to pick up some cans of cider and bottles of wine, refill our growler, and enjoy some wine and cider. We got the cheese plate and turkey/​ham sliders. It was a good amount of food for the both of us. I’d probably try the other items since they had a variety of flatbread options. I love the open fire pit. Someone did a really good job with the décor.

Wow!!! I’ve never seen a cider mill like this before. This is what all cider mills should aspire to be. Inside their store you can pick up their fresh produce and other Michigan made items like syrup, corn chips, and jerky. Do yourself a favor and get their snap peas. They are Ginormous.
I came for the lavender festival and was super happy that I did. They typically have you pick lavender but due to Michigan’s nasty winter weather and frost it was unavailable. They have nice vendors, chair yoga, massage, educational classes and a live animal demonstration that was super cool.
We sipped lavender lemonade, enjoyed lavender ice cream, and shared a lavender cupcake. I even treated my yoga instructor to a lavender infused fruit cup. I would go to this annually if I was in Michigan.
Coming up they have a hard cider event that sounds awesome. The tasting room also looked like a must try but I will have to visit that in nine months if you get my drift. We skipped the petting farm and you pick fruit but would love to try in the future.

My gf from Grand Blanc and I saw the guys on Best Bars in America (Esquire Network) visit Blake’s on their Detroit episode about 2 weeks before our visit to MI. So of course we had to visit Blake’s!
We took her parents there on a Friday afternoon. The place was full of kids (summer camp maybe?) but our main destination was the bar. And I must say, it was a blast. There was about 4 other tables along with ours. There was just a bartender handling service, so things were a bit slow but the quality of service and knowledge of cider was great. Not sure about the service complaints but our bartender was great.
We had the charcuterie plate and pretzel bites. Both were awesome and would order again and again.
The herb cream cheese that came with the charcuterie plate was amazing. The pretzel bites were pillow soft and the honey mustard that came with it was sweet upfront and super spicy on the back. It was awesome. Food was bomb!
The ciders were all great… we tried ALL 13 on tap. You can get 3 solid sized sample cups for 10 bucks (totally worth it the fun of trying more than just 1 or 2 ciders).
We preferred the sweeter/​less dry ciders. The only one we didn’t like was the lavender. It tasted like soap. But the smell was so great. And the keeved Cider was okay — no carbonation — tasted like apple juice, which was okay but not really our style. Still fun to try though.
Our faves had to be the mango infused (tasted mostly of mango and was like spiked mango juice) and the Elder Berry — could sip on that for a few hours. We took those two home with us.
The El Chavo was awesome too. The heat lingers in your throat the more you drink. It sneaks up on you. Not sure if I could have handled a full glass but a few solid sips was totally worth it.
Ended up buying some apple butter (amazing), strawberry rhubarb jelly (yet to try) and zesty dilly beans (great snap and kick).
And the first thing you smell when you walk into the general store is the doughnuts. And they tasted as good as they smelled. I’d eat a 100 of those.
I know I’ve said amazing a lot in this review, but this place did not disappoint. We spent about 2.5 hours between drinking, shopping, and picking strawberries and we loved it. Go! Go! Go!

This is not the place you want to be at on a beautiful Saturday if you don’t like crowds.
Parking was a mess but could have been fixed if Blakes had people directing traffic. People just park wherever they would like throughout the lots. More signage could help too. I didn’t see any handicapped parking.
There is plenty of things for families and kids to do, BUT you have to pay for it all. It’s $ 10.95 on weekends and includes: New Straw Mountain, Barnyard 500, Tricycle Track, Animal Petting Farm, Giant straw maze and jump, Cornfield Maze, Storybook Barn, Bunnyville, Mr. Bone’s Outhouse, Scarecrow band, Le Roy’s Apple Picking Truck, Playground, Haunted Village & Black Hole, Jumping Pillows, Pumpkin Jump, Train Ride, and Hayride to Pumpkin Patch. Children two and under are free. Seems like a lot of things to do for the price but seemed like many kids were very overwhelmed by everything.
Several shops to purchase all your fall goodies such as: donuts, cider, pies, candy and more! My family and I waited 55 minutes in line just to purchase cider and donuts. Several registers but everyone just piles in everywhere and there is no lines or roping.
Donut choices are plain, cinnamon sugar and powdered. Hot and tasty!
I would probably go again but perhaps during the week and if I had a child with me. Not much to do for older kids and adults besides food, apple picking, pumpkin picking and the new ciderhouse.

Great Cider! I had 3 different types. One was a lavender cider very good the other was cinnamon and last was a hopped cider. All of them were great.
–We did not get food to eat only went in the little shop and got some pumpkin butter and apples. The Donuts you have to go to the barn to get but they are dam tasty!
–We went on a Saturday and it was a bit crowded however we managed to get a table and just went up to the bar if we needed to order anything. They are fast and friendly here I cannot wait to go back.

I’ve never been apple picking before, so wasn’t sure what to really expect, but it’s basically exactly as it sounds, you’re just there picking apples, along with some various vegetables. Went with a group of friends, but after a few minutes, got kinda sick of eating apples. Seemed like a great place if you had kids or if you’re really into apples, but other than that, worth a trip just for the experience, but not a must-​go or worth a return trip.
The ciders at the bar were also described inaccurately. Forgot the name, but supposedly 2^nd most sweet cider (starts with an F), was not sweet at all. There were a couple more in the middle of their spectrum of sweet to dry that were definitely sweeter. So buyer beware, ask for samples.

Did you know this place has a winery? I came here today for the Lavender fest, and let me tell you, this place is awesome. It’s huge, clean, well maintained and has tons of activities for everyone.
For starters, they have an apple orchard, strawberry picking, a haunted house, a candy store and most importantly, a winery! They also have a children’s play area and a few other cool things as well.
I will probably come back for their store to get seasonal items, donuts and cider, along with whatever else they have going on. I’m not much of an apple picker anymore but want to try the winery part. Love that they have stuff for all ages.
I did some shopping in the store and bought a bag of donuts to take home with me. I passed on the candy store, but will be back in the future for other items as well.

This review is for the wine room/​hard cider tasting room. This place is really cool. Unfortunately I had no signal in this area so the pictures I had never uploaded. I did post some I took outside the Unilocal app.
Large bar and seating area. Super nice patio that was really pretty. They have a small food menu too. I posted the wine/​cider menu. We chose to get 2 flights with a mix of ciders and wine. The ciders didn’t knock my socks off :(I don’t know what I was expecting. They are more dry champagne like then hard cider to me. I got no fruit flavor. I’m a super fan of Angry Orchard so that’s my pallet expectancy. These were not bad, but just didn’t taste like cider. Almost more wine like the sweeter you tried. Weird, but not bad weird. Could have something to do with lack of fermenting time? I’m no brewmaster so don’t quote me on that guess.
That being said the wines were yummy. Liked the sweeter, didn’t try any red wine. Regardless of not being what I thought it’s definitely worth the trip. Still good. I hear they have showers and bachelor/​bachelorette parties here too. That’s really fun I.M.O.
The wine was 3 for 35 or 12 – 14 each. Cider was fill a growler for 20, 11 for a refill when you bring back the bottle. Prebottled was 11 – 12 I believe.
Overall, beautiful day and great experience. The bartenders were really nice and happy people. Goes a long way.