How Sweet it is to be Part of Hebron Maple Fest

This may sound sappy, but the town of Hebron has found a sweet way to ring in spring, by celebrating one of its most golden natural resources, maple syrup.

Over the weekend, volunteers and workers from throughout the region came early and stayed late to help Hebron Maple Fest, now in its 21st year, go off without a hitch, as thousands of visitors poured through to cure their cabin fever in Grade A weather.

All things maple were on display and on sale Saturday and Sunday as virtually every business, organization and club in town participated in the festival, which provides funding for programs at AHM.

“The best part is that it’s a very community thing,” said quilter Jenny Billard of Hebron. “Every local business does something and there’s something for everybody.”

Billard, a South African transplant who has been a part of the Hebron Historical Society’s quilting show since 2003, ever since her arrival in America, was set up with a lap quilt in Old Town Hall, where more than 100 quilts were on display.

Just outside the Old Town Hall, festival-goers were eagerly  chowing down and drinking up the atmosphere – literally. Icy maple milk sold by the Hebron Historical Society was a fair favorite, and the queue for free Farmer’s Cow ice cream was long, although worth the wait.

“It’s been extremely busy; we haven’t had a break yet – a lot of people coming up for seconds,” said Farmer’s Cow worker Sebastian Tonewo as he added homemade whipped cream, chopped walnuts and ribbons of locally-produced maple syrup to scoops of the Connecticut-based company’s free samples.

Farmer’s Cow, a milk cooperative of local dairy farms, was offering two flavors: Sugar Shack Maple Walnut and Muddy Boots Knee Deep in Chocolate, a new flavor that will be introduced soon.

Further down Main Street, in front of the Fire House, the Hebron Volunteer Fire Department was giving tours  and selling a unique maple treat called Sugar On Snow.

“You get it in your hair and you’re never getting it out,” Donna Cruess of Meriden said of the shaved ice topped with warm maple syrup.

That wasn’t going to stop 10-year-old Isabelle Goode of Amston, who got Sugar on Snow twice last year and looked forward to eating it again this year.

“I think it’s awesome,” she said, slurping it down. “It’s really good.”

A few feet over, volunteers from Hebron InterFaith Human Services were busy spinning homemade maple cotton candy, which smelled heavenly, and looked as if it had been plucked from the head of a white-haired grandmother.

The cotton candy was Katelyn Norman’s favorite part of Maple Fest. The 7-year-old could barely sit still while posing for a caricature from artist Bill Dougal, as the action swirled all around her.

She was thrilled to see the festival had gone to the dogs, with canine companions of every breed possible visible up and down Main Street, as their owners took advantage of warm temperatures and bright skies.

“If I had known there were going to be all the dogs, I would have brought my dog, Sunny,” Katelyn said.

Her mother, Karen Norman, said it was the family’s first time visiting Maple Fest, adding they would definitely be back next year.

“There’s not a lot going on in March,” she said. “It’s a fun family thing to do.”

After passing by the many vendors hawking maple baked goods and an army of Girl Scouts selling cookies, many families hopped into their cars and took short trips out to three of the festival’s four featured sugar houses.

Wenzel Sugar House, Woody Acres Sugar House and Pierce’s Sugar House were open to the public, offering tours and demonstrations of how sticky sap is gathered and boiled into sweet maple syrup.

Winding Brook Sugar House was also involved, but not on its home turf. Instead, Winding Brook’s Wayne Palmer brought the whole process right to the town’s center, ladling hot syrup street side.

Over at Wenzel Sugar House, tucked away inconspicuously behind the Wenzel family home at 522 East St., a small sign on the road lets passerby know “Maple syrup sold here.”

Maple Fest Committee Chairman Ron Wenzel, who runs the operation with wife, Joyce, is a proud proponent of the state’s maple-sugaring industry.

“Connecticut syrup has won more awards than Vermont in the last five years,” he pointed out when questioned about the other state’s supposed syrup superiority.

The Wenzel’s have been participating in Maple Fest since its inception 21 years ago, and Joyce said this frigid winter has helped make the spring sap collection a successful one.

“The sap’s been flowing very good this year,” she said. “[Friday] we gathered 800 gallons of sap.”

Those 800 gallons of sap were boiled down to make about 16 gallons of pure maple syrup, as this year, it’s taking approximately 50 gallons of sap to produce just one gallon of syrup, Ron Wenzel said.

“We’re producing syrup at about a gallon every 35, 40 minutes,” he said. “We’re doing really well.”

The Wenzels have 407 buckets hanging from trees, with one tap per tree, he said.

It’s a labor-intensive process to collect and cook up this much sap, but for Ron, it’s more than just a business: “I just do this cause I love it,” he said.

And customers seem to love the final product, which is used prominently in one of Maple Fest’s most decadent and beloved treats – maple pudding cake. The cake, served out of the Wenzel’s garage-turned-makeshift-bake shop, is warmed and topped with ice cream.

As if maple-pudding-cake enthusiasts weren’t creating enough of a traffic jam on narrow East Street, Farmer’s Cow representatives had also descended on the property, bringing a couple special guests.

Children of all ages were udderly enchanted as they clamored to pet two black and white cows.

The prince of the party was Buddy, a 10-day-old calf from Hebron’s Maple Leaf Farm, whose cuteness was aww-inducing.

Looking after the baby cow was calf-sitter Ciri Miller, 10, of Woodstock, who couldn’t keep her hands off her young charge.

Like many of the others working and volunteering away from the hoopla in town, Ciri never got a chance to check out the rest of the fest.

“That’s the only bad thing – you never get to see the rest of it,” said chainsaw carver Oliver Cote of Scotland, who was stationed at Woody Acres Sugar House with his menagerie of bears, owls, mushrooms and other life forms divined from tree stumps.

“I get here before it starts and stay til after it’s over,” he said of his 14 years of selling chainsaw carvings at Maple Fest.

It’s a sweet price to pay for being a part of Hebron’s annual first rite of spring.