Keepin It Local Folks.

Eat My Words!
By Karin Edmondson

As unlikely as it might seem, sugar, like the recent popularity of artisanal salt, seems to have become a new boutique item. The baking aisle in Whole Foods boasts a mind boggling array of sugar options: white, brown, dark granulated, powdered, extra fine, fine, fruit sugar, superfine, ultra-fine, coarse, sanding sugar, turbinado, muscovado, free flowing brown sugars, liquid sugars, invert sugars, demerara. Then there are the sugar substitutes, those beloved by dieters (and already somewhat mythical—see the movie Swimming With Sharks)—the commercial ones that come in either the pink or the blue packets. The latest sugar substitute is sucralose, perhaps better known as Splenda. There’s some hot debate over the merits of Splenda. Its advertising boasts that its “made from sugar so it tastes like sugar,” but Google Splenda and a host of articles appear, warning of its harmful chemical makeup. The Cliff Notes version: sucralose is produced by chemically altering the structure of sucrose, or sugar, by substituting three chlorine atoms for three hydroxyl atoms, thus, in effect, making sucralose a chlorocarbon. Thankfully, one sweetener, maple syrup, has emerged unscathed from this health furor, and for several good reasons too. Just like most products obtained from nature, maple syrup is a pretty prefect sweetener, containing calcium, potassium, iron, magnesium and vitamins B2, B5 and B6, as well as folic acid.



Maple syrup is one of the New World’s oldest sweeteners. Most maple syrup producers will proudly say that they’ve been in business for many many years, probably close to about fifty, usually more. New York State’s official tree is the sugar maple, adopted as such in 1956. Maple syrup is also the state’s first agricultural product each year, and the state is ranked third in maple syrup production, right behind the maple syrup behemoths of Vermont and Maine. In 2003, New York State had 1.3 million taps and produced approximately 210,000 gallons of the sweet syrup, accounting for almost seventeen percent of the nation’s production. Sales of New York maple syrup topped at seven million dollars in 2003. The Catskill Mountain Region is blessed with several maple syrup and maple product producers, offering everything from basic maple syrup to maple by-products such as maple sugar (fantastic for baking—use in place of regular old brown sugar) and maple cream (excellent when slathered on English muffins, toast of any color or grain and freshly made biscuits). If you think maple syrup is just a breakfast food, log into www.epicurious.com and do a search for maple syrup. No less than 264 recipes are available, everything from the obvious muffins and French Toast to more unique maple cakes and glazes or basting sauces for salmon and vegetables. Maple syrup: it ain’t just for breakfast anymore.



Maple Sugar House of the Catskills

Like farming and other activities that depend on the generosity of Mother Nature, maple sugaring can be quite tricky. The nights still have to be freezing while the days need to warm up enough, to mid forties, for the sap to rise from the roots of the maple trees. For two weeks, I did not know whether the weather would cooperate enough so that Charlie Rothe, the proprietor of the Maple Sugar House of the Catskills, would be able to collect sap from his trees for boiling. For two weeks Charlie and I spoke via the phone. Our usual topic if discussion? The recent bizarre changes in the region’s weather: a mild, near balmy period toward the end of February, days in the upper forties a naughty tease, and then the plummeting temperatures, often in the teens of the first two weeks in March.

Charlie just didn’t know when he’d be able to boil his syrup so I hung on every phone call until the Thursday morning I retrieved his message from my voicemail: “Karin, its Charlie Rothe. We’re going to be boiling maple syrup this Saturday.”



Snow was falling the Saturday morning I set out from my mountain top to visit Charlie’s sap house, but by the time I arrived in Saugerties, the sun was shining and the temperatures were slowly climbing into the comfortable mid forties. I followed a line of SUVs and family cars down Wegebauer Road right to the front door of the newly constructed sugaring house. Above the door hung a sign in German: Das alte Forsterhaus, translated: The Old Forest House, which happened to be full with boy scouts, so I joined Pack 63, Den 5 of the Shokan Boy Scouts on a tour of the maple sugaring process.



Maple Sugar House of the Catskills is a family business in every sense of the word. Charlie Rothe manned the huge evaporator, or boiling tank, by turns explaining the process and heaving large cords of wood into the furnace. His wife, Kris, offered freshly baked banana bread, and their two angelic blonde daughters Mary and Eva were on hand as well. So was Opa Rothe, Charlie’s dad. The story of the Maple Sugar House of the Catskills unfolded as told to me, in turns, by the three of them.



The Rothes have several hundred acres in between Woodstock and Saugerties. Every single one of Opa Rothe’s four children live on the property. Opa Rothe’s house, a study in traditional German gingerbread architecture, is centrally located. Opa’s grandparents bought the initial 84 acres back in 1934. Today, Opa is surrounded by his four children, their respective husbands and wives and a whopping fourteen grandchildren. A certain warmth pervades their land. Maybe it’s the beautiful timbered houses Opa’s children have built (Opa owns a saw mill and logging business) but it’s more likely the smiles from the grandkids and the shouts of “Hello Opa!” we receive as he drives me through the property. Maybe it’s also the enormous draft horses, weighing about 2500 pounds each and still employed today in the Rothe’s logging business, that stand like gentle, giant sentinels from a bygone era in the field beyond one of the old barns.



The Rothes have been making maple syrup since 1934, but mostly for family and some lucky friends. Charlie Rothe has taken it commercial only in the last three or four years. Charlie has about 2000 taps, or spiles, attached to galvanized three-gallon buckets on his trees. On a good catch, he’ll have about a gallon of sap per bucket. The sap is poured into a 700 gallon open tank on truck wheels. The tank is then backed up onto a ramp and the sap is pumped through hoses into three 570-gallon holding tanks where the sap is measured for sugar content using a Refractometer in units called Brix. Sap right from a tree will usually have a sugar content of 1 to 3 1/2 Brix. (The final maple syrup will have a Brix measurement of 66 Brix.) The fresh sap is clear and light and tastes just like sugar water. Charlie has the sap storage tanks on the north side of the sugaring house in order to keep the sap as cold as possible to prevent fermentation, to keep the sap from getting rancid. The sap then goes via pipe through a reverse osmosis machine—basically the same concept of taking salted seawater and running it through the machine to get unsalted, drinking water. The reverse osmosis machine takes excess water out of the sap, turning sap with a 5% sugar content into sap with a 10% sugar content. The sap then goes into the boiling tank, or the evaporator. The syrup is boiled at about 217.5 degrees, usually approximately 7-7.2 degrees above the boiling point of water, 212 degrees. This is where the sap takes on the consistency of syrup. Steam billows forth from the evaporator and escapes out the top of the sugaring house via a moveable roof that can be raised and lowered by ropes. Charlie built his own special filter press that forces the syrup through about 10 filters so that the end product is crystal clear. Hold the syrup up to the light and it is a light golden amber color, completely see through, not a speck of anything in it.

Charlie usually produces a light Grade A syrup. Grade A syrup comes in light, medium and dark. The longer the sap is boiled, the darker the syrup becomes, so the goal is to boil the sap quickly at extremely high temperatures. Charlie’s reverse osmosis machine helps too. Charlie explains that sap collected early in the season will usually yield a lighter syrup while sap harvested later on tends to create a darker syrup. There is usually a four week maple sugaring season each year. Charlie collects sap every single day during the season, when the temperature is right of course. He also explains the Rule of 86. Charlie measures the sap fresh out of the tree, and if, for example, the sap has a measure of 5.2 Brix, he then divides 86 by 5.1 and gets 16.8 then adds +1 for a final number of 17.8 and this final number will tell him how many gallons of fresh sap at that Brix measure he will need to produce one gallon of 66 Brix maple syrup. The higher the sugar content or Brix of the fresh sap, the less of it he will need to make one gallon of pure maple syrup.



In addition to the grade A light syrup, Charlie produces a wonderful thick maple cream excellent to spread on breads, muffins and biscuits, and shakers of pure maple sugar for generous employ in all sorts of baked goods. Kris Rothe says she hardly ever uses brown sugar anymore—she simply substitutes maple sugar in any recipe that calls for plain old boring brown sugar.



Maple Sugar House of the Catskills is located at 72 Wegebauer Road, Saugerties, New York. Please call Charlie and Kris Rothe at 845 246 5014 for more information, to order or to stop by the shop in the sugaring house. The Smokehouse of the Catskills carries their full line of maple products as well. The Smokehouse of the Catskills is located at 724 Route 212 in Saugerties, New York. Please call Mike or Heidi Ferraro at 845 246 8767 for more information. Store hours are Tuesday through Saturday 8 am until 6 pm and Sunday 9 am until 4 pm.

Maple Leaf Butter Cookies*

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup maple sugar

1/2 cup grade A maple syrup

1 large egg

1 teaspoon salt

3 cups all purpose flour



In a standing electric mixer cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy and beat in maple syrup and egg yolk until mixture is combined well. Soft together salt and flour over mixture and fold in thoroughly. Chill dough, wrapped in plastic wrap until firm, about 2 hours. Dough may be made 4 days ahead and chilled.



Preheat oven to 350 degrees.



Divide dough in half. Keeping, on half chilled, lightly flour other half and on a lightly floured surface, gently pound with a rolling pin to soften. Roll out dough 1/8 inch thick and with a floured maple leaf cookie cutter (or any other shape cutter you have handy) cut out cookies, chilling scraps. Arrange cookies on buttered baking sheets. Make cookies in the same manner until all scraps and dough are used. Bake cookies in the middle of the oven until edges are golden, about 12 minutes, and transfer to racks to cool. Cookies keep in airtight container for 1 week. Makes about 40 cookies.

*reprinted from Gourmet/ www.epicurious.com

Local Farm Updates



Catskill Region Farmers Market at the Catskill Point

There are a few openings at the Catskill Region Farmers' Market for the 2005 season. The market, located in the historic Catskill Point market building, runs from June 11 until October 29 with a special Thanksgiving Market in November. If you would like more information and an application please contact Mick Bessire at Cornell Cooperative Extension Greene County, 518 622 9820.



Heather Ridge Farm (profiled November 2003)

Heather Ridge Farm is a new farm that is 200 years old and is situated in old diary pastures and antique apple orchards. Carol Clement and John Harrison specialize in pastured and grass-fed beef, pork, chickens and turkeys. Absolutely no antibiotics, hormones or chemicals are used on the farm. Carol and John will be hosting their Open House Sale on Saturday, April 23 from 12 until 4 pm. The fall 2004 crop of their signature “heather honey” is available now. All the usual items will be for sale: beef and pork, select lamb cuts, chicken wings, organic raw honey and Irish-style Lemon Honey, culinary herbs, eggs, fresh garlic, turkey, pork and chicken brines made with her own honey, herbs and spices and sea salt, baked goods, candles and soaps. There are several new items: wheels of Kunik, a sinfully luscious goat-cow cheese, several new types of artisan cheese from Brovetto’s including dill and all natural dog biscuits and bones: In the spirit of the family farm, Carol’s enterprising nieces have started making all natural dog biscuits, with a touch of Heather Ridge Farm honey, named “Madame Clementine’s Bones.” Carol’s canine taste testers, her two Aussies Rafferty and Peig, gave their approval! Also for our canine friends: real frozen beef bones, cut in chunks. Make your dog very happy this month!



It is also fresh chicken ordering time. Please e-mail Carol and John at HeatherRidgeFarm@aol.com for a PDF ordering form or to have an order form snail-mailed to you. Whole and cut-up chickens will be available fresh at the June-October sales. Please get your order back to Carol ASAP to insure that chickens will be reserved for you at the June sale. It’s not too early to reserve your turkey either. You can also indicate on the form if you are interested in a side of beef, pork or lamb that will be available in the autumn.



Heather Ridge Farm is located at 989 Broome Center Road in Preston Hollow. For more information and directions please call Carol or John at 518 239 6234 or e-mail them at HeatherRidgeFarm@aol.com. Open by appointment as well.



* Got a hot tip on a Catskill area farm? Please feel free to e-mail me at edmondsonk@catskillmtn.org or KarinaEdmondson@yahoo.com with any questions or leads on a local farm that you think more people should get hip to!