Ashtarout started off as a project to help alleviate the financial impact the Lebanese state's policies were having towards all agricultural farmers and the affects of the Syrian war. During a small period of two seasons, apple farmers went from being able to earn a living to sustaining serious losses to their livelihood.
We saw that there was a huge lack of diversity regarding apple products and alternative sources that apples could become. So one day, we decided to purchase some wild yeast from Ireland made to create apple cider like they drink in the commonwealth countries. Unfortunately we did not get the recipe right and because it takes so long to create cider, we had to put the project on hold. Determined to continue, we tried making pasteurized natural apple juice and it was a big success. Thus, "Ashtarout Apple Juice" was born. We became an apple juice company which produced small batches of pure apple juice with no added sugar or water to dilute or alter the product.
Originally we intended to also produce a variety of apple products but found that there was a lack of consumer awareness and funding to branch out at that time. After two years we decided to focus on producing arak full-time and have been improving on our recipe ever since, including a new addition of Ashtarout Arak from our organic orchard under conversion.