LOCAL FLAVOR: Adding value: Can you improve on the simple goodness of maple syrup? Entrepreneurs and farmers in Southern Vermont are using the sweet stuff in ways that might surprise you.
Maple syrup. It’s never been just for pancakes. The Algonquins wouldn’t have been surprised at the current entrepreneurial nature of the “sugaring” industry. It’s well-known that Native Americans were tapping northern maples for centuries before the first settlers came, and the legend has it that the delicious sweet sap was discovered when a woman — naturally, it was a woman — used some of it to boil up the evening venison. So put...
WEDDINGS: Mount Snow Valley
WEDDINGS: Mount Snow Valley The Mount Snow Valley provides numerous options for a destination wedding, including a winery with vistas of two states, and many charming inns that host tented weddings on their grounds. The Mount Snow Resort features spectacular mountain views or indoor ballrooms. Cooper Hill Inn boasts wedding couples can get married on “top of the world.” Owned and operated by the same family for over 80 years, Boyd...
WINE OBSERVED: Weighing the options: Planning a wedding or celebration? Here’s how you can find a wine that will please a number of different palates and complement a wide variety of foods
Here is something to think about as you plan your wedding (or other gathering, for that matter): What wine will you serve at your reception? If you are having the reception at an inn or managed property, you might be limited to buying your wine directly through them or paying a per-bottle corkage fee for what you supply yourself. Even if you are paying a $20 per bottle corkage fee, you can often do better supplying your own wine....
WEDDINGS: Sidebar/Three tips for selecting your wedding cake
Sharon Myers of Sharon Myers Fine Catering in Brattleboro (who made the cakes in the two photos in this story) suggests the following tips: • Cupcakes seem to be the rage right now. They give you an opportunity to offer two or three varieties to your guests. • If chocolate is your favorite and your groom/partner loves lemon, you can ask for different tiers to be different flavors. Or do two cakes for a real splash. • If you are going...
SIDEBAR: Syrup for 10,000: One Vermonter takes his family trade into the 21st century
Peter Cooper-Ellis, who owns and operates Hidden Springs Maple online and retail in Putney, and his family have been making maple syrup for more than 50 years, selling under the Cooper-Ellis Sugar Makers label during the 1950s and ’60s. Yet Cooper-Ellis, who holds an engineering degree from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, lives in San Francisco, where he works at a software company in Palo Alto. He commutes east about once a...
SIDEBAR: Long a draw: Revitalizing the arts in Bennington County
Long a draw Revitalizing the arts in Bennington County Bennington and Dorset in Southern Vermont have long been a draw for artists who found inspiration in Vermont rural beauty and simple country lifestyle. As early as the 1870s, creative individuals and their families began to drive north during the summer months when travel was easiest. Answering the call for local cultural fare, by the end of the 1920s, the Dorset Players and the...
It’s a tough job, but somebody had to do it: What does aging maple syrup in a bourbon barrel do to flavor that’s already Grade A? Quite a bit, actually.
Our publisher had emailed me a photo of a bottle of Baker Farm Bourbon Barrel Aged Pure Maple Syrup. “Already on it,” I said. She was reassured until she saw the text of the story, which showed that we most certainly were not on it. Turns out, I had thought the image that she sent me was illustrating the product of Saxtons River Distillery, which produces maple liqueur. The photo of a big flask-o-booze sitting in my email? It’s a...
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