Very little time to muse these days! Welcome to the farm~
It is high-summer. Quiet summer mornings, birds chattering at their fledglings, and the weeds growing with vigor.
We have been super busy on the farm this summer--busier than normal (which is pretty darn busy!)--
due to the outpouring of interest and support from people across the country who were introduced to Tapatree by Chef Katie Button. Chef Katie is a remarkable woman who started her career studying biomolecular science and chemistry at Cornell University. After obtaining a masters in Paris, she changed course and launched into her true love: the culinary arts. We admire her science mind and her foodie passion–it combines so much curiosity and creativity. The World loves her, too! Chef Katie has an exciting show entitled From the Source, in which she visits artisans curating the world of authentic ingredients. (For the amazing crew filming and producing the show, visit Blue Chalk Media!) In Season II, Chef Katie explores everything from kelp off the coast of Maine to truffles in North Carolina, to, you guessed it…maple syrup at Zoar Tapatree! When we received a call last September to participate in Chef Katie’s show, we were delighted. Part of Tapatree’s mission is to open up a world of artisanal maple, highlighting terroir and the magic of minimally processed syrup. Trees are an amazing way to intimately explore “the taste of a place.” Our delight increased exponentially when we saw how quickly Chef Katie and her team appreciated the culinary possibilities of artisanal syrup, together with her excitement for the entire process of carefully concentrating sap into delicious elixirs.
Suffice it to say, the program was very good on messaging and so many people responded enthusiastically. SO many people responded that every waking hour was immediately absorbed by packing, bottling and shipping syrup across the country! We put stops on the store inventory so that we wouldn’t accidentally oversell, and also to make sure that we could ship out orders with some semblance of responsiveness. Small can sometimes be challenging in an Amazon world, but again, we are trying to carve out space where small syrup-makers can be sustainable. And the key here is that they become sustainable because they are making something very special with care. Small is the space we hope to make into “specialty” by the addition of intention and respect.
We are preparing to release most of the batched syrups in the coming week or two. If you’re hoping to acquire some of the tastes of 2022, the best approach is to register on our website. We will be sending out a notice in advance with the date and time of the drop. After that, we will also put a notice on Instagram and Facebook. The syrups this year were unique–every year has its surprises! We hope you love them as much as we do.
Soak in these precious moments of summer. I try to envision the trees without their leaves, snow piling against the house, the smell of woodsmoke on the air. And then I smile, relishing the feel of sandals on my feet and warm air on bare skin. Every season has its delights, but summer is special for how it welcomes us in.