County Terroir is decanted once again for its 7th year to celebrate the end of Spring and to welcome Summer! This anticipated annual showcase for new County wines (presented by Prince Edward County Winegrowers Association) returns to the beautiful Crystal Palace in Picton, on Saturday May 26th, 2012.
With over 30 wineries, Prince Edward County has much to experience. Many County wineries will introduce their new Spring releases and serve their own unique wines paired with delicious cheeses and other gourmet food tastings. Guests will also have the opportunity to take part in seminars, demonstrations and meet the winemakers themselves while tasting some of Ontario’s finest. The event’s $35 in advance ticket price includes all wine samples and one food pairing.

Additional food pairings are available for purchase. Guests from across the province will be in attendance as there is much to discover in Prince Edward County. Bus/train weekend packages will allow visitors from Toronto to Ottawa to experience all that The County has to offer, with County winery tours, gourmet
dinners, and accommodations that range from quaint to posh.

When: May 26th from 12pm to 8pm
Where: The Crystal Palace, Main Street Fairgrounds, Picton

“World’s least-known great wine zone” – Wine Spectator Magazine
“Burgundy of the North” & “Vineyard Haven” – Wine Bloggers

Upcoming transportation options & package deals to be announced soon at:

www.countyterroir.ca
www.facebook.com/CountyTerroir
www.twitter.com/CountyTerroir

For all media inquiries, contact:
Emma Brown – emma@powerjuncture.ca

An expanded Great Canadian Cheese Festival returns to historic Crystal Palace in Picton, in the heart of Prince Edward County, on the first weekend in June.

The Cheese Festival is the only event in Canada to bring together cheesemakers from coast-to-coast so cheese lovers, foodies and culinary tourists can meet to learn, talk, taste and buy the best in artisan, farmstead and specialty cheese—and sample fine wine, craft beer and artisan foods.

The Festival’s Artisan Cheese & Fine Food Fair (where consumers can sample and buy product) will run two days this year, Saturday and Sunday, June 2 and 3. It was one day last year.

More than 100 cheeses, produced by artisans from Vancouver Island to Prince Edward Island, will be available for tasting and purchase. The largest contingent of producers will be from Quebec, Canada’s leading cheese region.

Artisan foods, ranging from chutney to preserves to sausage and sweets, will also be available, as will Ontario fine wines, craft beer and cider.

The culinary and social highlight of the Festival takes place Saturday evening, at the Cooks & Curds Gala, eight leading chefs from across Canada will use Canadian cheeses to create tasting dishes that will be paired with Canadian wine, craft beer and cider. The evening will conclude with sweets, ice wine, port and coffee. Participating chefs will include Jamie Kennedy, Jamie Kennedy Kitchens, Toronto; Michael Blackie, National Arts Centre, Ottawa; Dominic Serio, Inn at Bay Fortune, Prince Edward Island, Marc Cohen, Lawrence, Montreal; and Katie Hayes, Bonavista Social Club, Newfoundland.

At the Cheese Fair on Saturday and Sunday, Dairy Farmers of Canada, the Festival’s top-tier sponsor, will offer seminars presented by leading cheese educator Deborah Levy in the All You Need Is Cheese® Annex. With sampling of cheese, of course!

The Festival Dairy Farm will be open both days to give city folk a look at the animals that start the process of turning grass into milk into cheese. Yvette, the matriarch of the water-buffalo herd at Ontario Water Buffalo Company near Stirling, Ontario, will likely be the star attraction.

Added to the Cheese Fair this year is a food court featuring Cheesewerks of Toronto, Primitive Cuisine of Trenton and Buddha Dog of Picton.

Concurrent with the Cheese Fair, a program of Tutored Tastings will be offered on topics such as Artisan Cheese Tasting 101, Taste of Québec and Best of the West, presented by cheese experts Julia Rogers, Andy Shay, Vanessa Simmons and Janice Beaton and wine expert David Lawrason. A separate ticket is required.

The pre-Festival program on Friday, June 1, features:

• An all-day Cheese Tour of nearby Black River Cheese and Fifth Town Artisan Cheese and other food- and farm-related stops;
• Cooking with Artisan Cheese Class conducted by Cynthia Peters, a personal chef and food writer who owns and operates the acclaimed From the Farm Cooking School in Prince Edward County;
• Great County Dine Around at restaurants featuring cheese-themed dinners. The county is known as the fasting-growing culinary destination in Ontario.

Georgs Kolesnikovs, founder and director of the Festival, maintains the popular cheese blog CheeseLover.ca.

The Festival is produced by Cheese Lover Productions with the generous support of Celebrate Ontario. Dairy Farmers of Canada is Diamond Sponsor, Ontario’s Artisan Food and Beverage Region (FAB) is Gold Sponsor. A portion of Festival proceeds will benefit a Cheese Scholarship Fund to encourage young Canadians to pursue careers in cheese.

Advance tickets are sold online at www.CheeseFestival.ca. In order to assure a high-quality experience for exhibitors and attendees, Cheese Fair attendance will be capped at 1,500 each day, so don’t delay in ordering your tickets.

Sugarbush Vineyards

Saturday March 31 & Sunday April 1
11 am to 5 pm

Robert and Sally Peck got the inspiration to start their vineyard while honeymooning in the Okanogan Valley in the late 1990’s. After purchasing their farm and deciding to settle in the County, the couple were unsure of what to name their future vineyard. The former owners of the land informed them that there was a substantial sugarbush on the property: Sugarbush Vineyards was born.

Hand-harvesting their vineyard, and producing six different grape varietals would be enough to keep most people busy, but three years ago  this ambitious couple decided they would begin tapping their sugarbush – the old fashioned way. Using no tubing, they tap about 100 trees using traditional buckets. Once collected, the sap is boiled down over an open fire using an old fashioned sap pan. This takes a considerable commitment – the first one up in the morning, must light the fire and keep it going until 11pm. This hard work amounts to the production of about 5-10 litres of syrup a day. The entire season produces about 50 litres for the family to sell in their winery, which is celebrating its 10^th anniversary this year.

Admittedly, they make maple syrup for the fun of it. Though not a large-scale operation, they’d be thrilled if you visited them! This year, Sugarbush Vineyards will be boiling the syrup adjacent to the tasting room, making maple fudge s’mores for children, and selling many maple goodies in store. Visit them and take the 2-3 km hike out to their sugarbush (please bring appropriate outdoor clothing). After your walk enjoy a tasting of their wine – made entirely from grapes from their vineyard.

Sugarbush Vineyards

• -Purchased property on Wilson Rd in 2000.
• -Planted grape vines in 2002 and 2003.
• -Opened winery tasting room in 2007.
• -Tapped our first trees (30 taps) in 2010.
• -100 taps in 2012.  Boiling down over an open fire using an old family flat pan.

Ty's Old Fashioned Kettlecorn - photo by Sheena Williams

Vader’s Maple Syrup
1260 Cty. Rd 18, Cherry Valley, Ontario
613.476.5231
Saturday, March 31 & Sunday, April 1
9 am to 4 pm

Bottles of Vader’s maple syrup are a familiar sight in County shops and supermarkets, but many maple fans still prefer to go to the Vader’s farm shop or the Vader’s kitchen door to buy their syrup.

Grandfather Arnold Vader learned the craft from his own father and grandfather and has been making maple syrup himself for more than 60 years. These days he takes it a little easier and lets his sons and grandchildren carry on the tradition. Arnold is famous for his stories about the old days of maple syrup making and just about everything else in the County, and he shares his stories with visitors on Maple in the County weekend.

Arnold’s son Todd is chief syrup maker now. He’s been doing it for 25 years on the farm that his great grandfather bought in 1910. Todd makes the point that – sweet as it is – maple syrup is far from frivolous. It’s a real crop, the farmer’s first crop of the year. Todd and his sons farm corn and soy and run a dairy operation too. But for a short, intense period each spring they focus on maple syrup working hard to tend an astounding 2,500 taps on direct lines to the sugarshack, and about 300 old fashioned buckets in areas where they can’t string lines.

Old style tools and vintage photos are on show during Maple in the County, while the sap house itself is state-of-the-art, and visitors get a close look at the powerful oil fired evaporator by climbing up to a wooden viewing platform. Maple weekend is a time for celebration with the Vader family with storytelling, maple tastings and music. It’s tradition and history and a great family business.

This year, come and be educated and entertained by family and friends of the County’s longest running maple producers since 1910. Enjoy a tour of the sap house, try Ty’s Kettlecorn popped on-site or enjoy mouth-watering taffy.  A variety of maple products available.

Vader’s Maple Syrup

• -used sap house already on farm
• -1910 first tapped 400 taps
• -flat pan
• -1962 new sugar house was built
• -1989 oil fired evaporator
• -1992 added a new room
• -1997 added another new room
• -2008 new welded pans and a piggy back steam system
• -2011 inducted into the Quinte Local Maple Hall of Fame showcased at the Ameliasburgh Museum in the Grimm Sap Shanty.

All photos by Sheena Williams

Feeding the Jersey Cows - photo by Wendy Wild

This year, visit John’s farmyard sugar shack and watch him turn sap into syrup in his high-efficiency wood-fired evaporator. Bring the kids for an afternoon in the sand box, in the yard, or a play date in the barn with the new lambs, chickens, pigs and the baby jersey calves, while mom and dad enjoy a delicious maple pork sausage on a bun or a hearty bowl of homemade chicken noodle soup.

JC Nyman Farms
292 Mowbray Road, Picton
613.476.6120
Saturday, March 31 & Sunday, April 1
9am to 5pm

Every March, as John’s parents farmed, he could be found in the sugarbush. Just 12-years old when he built his first sugar shack, today JC Nyman Farms can proudly say it has more than 20 years of maple syrup experience under its belt. Starting out with 40 plastic ice cream buckets 20 years ago,  JC Nyman Farms today has 900 taps mostly on pipeline with a few on buckets.  Boiling is done in the farm yard sugar shack on a newer high efficiency wood fired evaporator.

John’s picturesque 78 acre farm (located just outside Picton) is ethical, sustainable and animal-friendly. Its mix of productive farm- and pasture-land allow John to produce the very best grass fed lamb, pork, beef, eggs, free-range chickens and turkeys you’ll ever eat.

John maintains an open door policy, encouraging visitors to peek in every nook and cranny to see for themselves that the farm is a happy and healthy place to raise the animals.  During Maple in the County don’t be surprised if it’s a riot of adorable lambs bounding around in the barn!

JC Nyman Farms

• -Started in 1993 with 40 taps
• -1994 built sugar house, used cherry pails to gather sap, boiled down on a Grimm syrup pan
• -At age 15 in 1996 he had a used 2X6 Dominion & Grimm evaporator, installed tubing
• -2011 new evaporator and now has 900 taps

Piglets and Lambs - photos by Wendy Wild

Waupoos Winery has always been a supporter of the Maple in the County festival. This year, they’re expanding their programming to include a pancake breakfast in the morning, and a traditional meal of ham and beans in the afternoon – all prepared by Waupoos Chef Scott Royce. They hope to have their marketplace store open in time for the Maple weekend, alongside a petting zoo, maple syrup demos and toffee on snow or ice. Complimentary tastings will be offered at the winery all weekend – and maple syrup will be readily available!

Waupoos Winery & Sugarbush
3016 County Road 8, Waupoos
613.476.8338
www.waupooswinery.com

Kyle Baldwin’sfamily has been making maple syrup for generations. His grandmother’s family began the tradition in Quebec long ago – this was passed down to his father who began making syrup in Consecon in the early 1980’s. Shortly after, Kyle began tapping his own trees and continuing the family legacy. His mother was originally from Waupoos, so it seemed a perfect fit when Kyle began working with Waupoos Winery. Noticing a substantial sugarbush behind the barn on the north side of the property, Kyle finally convinced original owners Ed Neuser & Rita Krauss to allow him to begin tapping the trees in 1997. It’s clear that Kyle has true passion for what he does, and enjoys bringing another great product onto the shelves of the Waupoos tasting room.

Waupoos Estates Winery has expanded to include the North side of their  property with three exciting new businesses.

The Marketplace
filled with gourmet foods, packed picnic baskets and the essentials for our boater friends.

The Boathouse
stocked with antique ships, nautical items and man cave favourites.

The Garden Shed
equipped with items to make your garden stand out.
We will also have a petting zoo for the kids, wagon ride tours in our back vineyard and live music events all summer long.

The pancake breakfasts held at Honey Wagon have always been fundraisers for local organizations. Currently they are pleased to be working with their local Hallowell Volunteer Firefighters who use the money gained to purchase needed firefighting equipment for the area.  This year they will have on display a Rescue Saw which is used in extreme situations…cutting through steel doors etc.  It was  purchased with money received through your generous support of their previous breakfasts.

Come enjoy some good fun and community spirit as we all welcome the first crop of the season.  Join our firefighters as they cook up a storm of delicious pancakes, sausages, beans and of course, maple syrup.

Honey Wagon Farms
265 Sandy Hook Road, Picton
613.476.6191
Sat. & Sun., 9 am to 4 pm

About Honey Wagon Farms
When Sandi and Ed Taylor came to the County in 1993 they knew they wanted to both farm and produce maple syrup on a small scale.  A year of searching led them to what is now known as Honey Wagon Farms located just down the road from the Waring House.  This purchase allowed them to fulfill that desire to grow veggies without the use of herbicides, fungicides or pesticides and to make maple syrup.

The farm originally had a limited source of maple trees.  Fortunately, several years after moving in, they were able to add to their maple operation with the purchase of an adjacent sugar bush from the Lockyer family.  Now each new season begins with the tapping of 550 trees at the back of their 86 acre farm.  They began production using traditional methods and continue to do so today. They still hang buckets to gather sap, boil on an open wood fired evaporator in the sugar shack located close to their house and filter the syrup, gravity feed, through felts.  Their syrup is sold in uniquely designed decorative gift bottles….great for home use or as gifts for family and friends alike.  In keeping with their efforts to be environmentally friendly these bottles lend themselves to a variety of uses after.

Honey Wagon Farms

•  1995 began tapping 50 trees, boiled on an open pan over an open wood fire in backyard
• 1996 – 1999 added another 250 taps
• 1999  built a protective shack in the back yard
• 2000 added another 100 taps
• 2001 built sugar shack by our house, installed Dominion and Grimm evaporator
• 2002  replaced evaporator with larger size D and G
• 2003  added another 100 taps
• 2005 added another 50 taps
• 2012 continue traditional production, gather in buckets, boil on open wood fired evaporator, filter through felts

“Shiny toys for the big boys”

Stone’s Maple Syrup,
644 Cty. Rd. 5, Picton, Ontario
613.476.6134

This year, come and see antique tractors—shiny toys for the big boys. Free wagon rides through the sugar bush to the sap shanty. Watch maple syrup being made the time-honoured way: in open pans over a wood-fired evaporator. Maple syrup, maple butter and other maple products available for purchase along with complimentary coffee.

Doug Stone

Doug Stone grew up on a dairy farm. He bought his own farm in 1979, choosing one with an established sugarbush. When he began tapping trees in 1980 he would hang 500 sap buckets then drive around on his tractor emptying each bucket into a big tank to take back to the sugar shack. He built an addition onto the

farm’s original sugar shack and in 1985 bought a new wood-fired evaporator that takes full advantage of the abundance of fallen trees as fuel. (Doug heats his home with wood, too.)

Twenty years on, Doug no longer hangs buckets. Now he drills tap holes and connects each tree to a sturdy plastic line that runs straight to the evaporator.

Doug and his family welcome about 900 visitors for the Maple in the County event. Their antique tractors are a huge attraction, but everybody enjoys the maple butter and maple sugar treats. They can also enjoy a special coffee, made with raw sap instead of water for a very distinctive taste.

Doug says maple producers are a great bunch of people, hard working, supportive and dedicated to the art. They have traveled around Canada to see how other producers work and are active in promoting County maple syrup at events like TASTE! a celebration of regional cuisine.

Trevor Stone

Stone’s Maple Products

• 1979 – started with a few taps and a flat pan
• 1980 – built sugarhouse, first evaporator was a Grimm
• 1985 – new Waterloo evaporator
• 1988 – installed tubing
• 2010 – new welded pans

Wagon Rides

Tom Mikel carves a chair. Photo by Sheena Williams

Pancakes, Wagon Rides, Lumberjack Show and more.

Sat. March 31 &          Sun. April 1, 2012
9 am to 3 pm
Celebrate spring at Hubbs Sugarbush.  Enjoy wagon rides from Sweetwater Cabin to the Sugarhouse and Pancake Breakfast at Hubbs. This year will feature a new lumberjack show featuring Tom Mikel of the Prince Edward Land Stewardship Council. Breakfast will also be served at the Lake Masonic Lodge. The Lake Masonic Lodge No. 215 35th Annual Pancake Breakfast proceeds will benefit community projects. All activities are weather permitting.

Hubbs Sugarbush and Sweetwater Cabin
Hosts: Ron and Janice
1937 Rednersville Rd. 3 and 332 Pulver Rd., Carrying Place
613.966.8997
www.sweetwatercabin.com
facebook.com/sweetwatercabin

Ron Hubbs grew up on a dairy farm and once grew cash crops himself. Now he works in the municipality’s roads and engineering department, but this fourth generation farmer still produces one great crop a year – sweet and spicy maple syrup. He’s carrying on a family tradition of more than 100 years.

The family farm has an old established sugarbush with 14 kms of thoroughly modern plastic tubing to collect the sap. But as well as tending the old bush up a lane and over the hill from the farmhouse, Ron planted a new orchard in 1989. He dug out young maples that were struggling for light and replanted them on a sunny south-facing slope behind the house. With 100 trees per acre the orchard captures maximum sunlight to ensure the best possible yield of sap, and it’s almost ready to harvest sap.

Janice Hubbs created their Sweetwater Cabin from a very old log cabin they rescued from Lanark County. Rebuilt and looking great, the little cabin welcomes visitors all year round to sample syrup and maple treats. A wonderful selection of maple themed antiques and accessories are on display and for sale, and a stuffed “fisher,” a furry little carnivore that could chew its way through plastic lines faster than lightning but who met his fate on the road outside, now sits stuffed and watchful amid the maple paraphernalia.

Janice is curator of the Ameliasburgh Museum and a fountain of knowledge about the history of the County and of maple syrup. Just as the Indians taught settlers how to make maple syrup to sweeten their hard lives, Janice enthusiastically shares her love and knowledge of all things maple with schoolchildren, guests and her hundreds of Maple in the County visitors.

Timeline

• 1975 -started in with 600 taps. Met Odie Grimm of the Grimm Manufacturing Company, added 200 taps on tubing, used a 3X12 Grimm evaporator
• 1977  -hosted Lake Lodge’s first pancake breakfast
• 1980  -built a new sugarhouse
• 1983  -bought new pans
• 1985  -installed tubing
• 1989  -started planting trees in our maple orchard
• 1993  -bought a new Hurricane evaporator
• 2003  -opened Sweetwater Cabin Maple store
• 2008  -bought new pans
• 2009  -inducted into the Quinte Local Maple Hall of Fame

This year, enjoy homemade pancakes, grilled sausages and pure maple syrup—made fresh all day long —for Adults $10, Children $5. Work off that breakfast by taking a walking tour of the sugar bush and learn all about maple syrup production in the sugar shack.

Fosterholm Farms
2234 Cty. Rd. 18, Picton, Ontario,
613.393.5655
www.fosterholmfarms.ca

Cliff Foster’s father started making maple syrup in 1924 at the home farm near Sandbanks. He spent everything he had to buy 75 acres, and at first he lived in the barn because the farm had no house. But it had a sugarbush, and he tapped the trees and hung 375 sap buckets. He worked hard, built a house and eventually bought Outlet Farm that had another good sugarbush. So he bought another 325 buckets.

Now Cliff runs Fosterholm Farms with his son Dean with help from his two grandsons. Each year they tap 7,000 trees, but Cliff and Dean no longer hang buckets – they collect sap by running lines to each tree. Taps and lines go in beginning in January and come out in April.

The Foster family evaporator is oil fired, and with the price of oil rising, Cliff is thankful for his reverse osmosis system that removes 70% of the water from the sap before it even reaches the evaporator making huge savings on boiling time. It’s a tough machine, built in 1967 and going strong.

Maple in the County kicks off the season for the Foster family, and in 2005 a thousand people visited them in the sugar shack to enjoy home made pancakes with sausages and as much maple syrup as they wanted. Cliff is generous with his syrup and puts big jugfuls on the table for guests to help themselves. His dad would be proud!

Timeline

• 1924  -Fosterholm Farms started in with 267 buckets and a 2X8 Lightning evaporator
• 1967  -built new sugarhouse and had a 4X12 Lightning evaporator
• 1970  -started to use tubing
• 2001  -had a 5X14 oil-fired evaporator
• 2003  -built on a bottling room
• 2007  -bought a Reverse Osmosis machine
• 2011  -inducted into the Quinte Local Maple Hall of Fame