Celebrate Spring with the NH Maple Experience

The sap is running!

Spring has sprung here in the North Country, and we can’t think of a better way to celebrate than by enjoying the New Hampshire Maple Experience! We opened the 2012 Maple season at TheRocks Estate on Saturday, and we’ll keep on celebrating for the next three weekends.

That means maple syrup tastings, chef demonstrations, horse-drawn wagon rides, and hands-on learning about maple sugaring.

This weekend we’ll welcome two local chefs to the Maple Experience, and you won’t want to miss what they’re cooking up. On Saturday, Chef Adam Parker from the Indian HeadResort will be here from noon-1p.m. dishing up a divine crumble salad with romaine lettuce, cranberries, blue cheese and walnuts topped with Maple Balsamic Vinaigrette. He’ll follow that with Maple-glazed Scallops with a Maple Beurre Blanc over pasta. Yum!

And if you missed Chef Orlo Coots of the Adair Country Inn & Restaurant last weekend, you’re in luck – he’ll be back at The Rocks on Sunday from noon-1 p.m. making his delicious Maple Balsamic Glaze, oh-so-good Whipped Maple Mascarpone, and delectable Walnut Angel Food Chiffon Cake.

Sour pickle face.

As if that’s not enough, the Maple Experience includes a tasting of our own local maple syrup, accompanied by the traditional fresh donut and sour pickle – the perfect blend of sweet and sour! We’re inviting all our Maple visitors to post a photo of their best “sour pickle face” on our Facebook page this season.

To find out more about the Maple Experience and all it includes, please visit the New Hampshire Maple Experience website.

Happy maple sugaring season!

Coming soon... more Maple Experience!

Heading out for a wagon ride through The Rocks Estate.

As the days grow longer toward mid-winter, our thoughts at The Rocks Estate turn from Christmas trees to maple syrup and a new season of the New Hampshire Maple Experience.

Maple Experience visitors learn firsthand about the age old tradition of creating maple syrup and sugar from the sugar maple trees abundant in our region. Our staff and volunteers at The Rocks lead visitors on a journey through the history of sugaring – dating back to the Native Americans and earliest European settlers here – right through to the modern process, with a trip to our sugar house, a horse-drawn wagon ride through our historic property, and a tasting of the maple syrup produced from the sap of sugar maples growing on The Rocks Estate.

To make the Maple Experience extra sweet, we’re adding a few new features to the program this year. The first is the option to enjoy sugar-on-snow, where we’ll heat syrup and drizzle it over snow to create a delicious toffee-like concoction that’s sure to satisfy the sweetest sweet tooth!

... and sour!

Syrup and pickles - sweet...

We’ve also invited some of the best local chefs to join the Maple Experience this year, and they’ll demonstrate their cooking styles as they create mouthwatering goodies to share – using maple syrup and sugar, of course!

One of our favorite parts of the Maple Experience is the maple syrup tasting visitors enjoy. We always recommend pairing the syrup with fresh donuts and sour pickles for a wonderful combination of sweet and sour. This year, we invite visitors to post their favorite “sour pickle face” photos to our Facebook page.

The Maple Experience will be held at The Rocks Estate March 17, 24-25, 31-April 1, and April 7. 

For more about the Maple Experience, please read our full article.