Get Ready To Sugar House Hop This NH Maple Weekend

MASON, NH — There will be maple walnut pancakes and maple bacon-stuffed French toast in the Maple Barn restaurant. There will be maple-glazed donuts and maple coffee in the Outpost cabin. There will be plenty of maple syrup for sale in the Corn Crib Gift Shoppe.

Like many other sugar shacks across the state, Parker’s Maple Barn in Mason is gearing up for big crowds and a lot of sweet treats for this year’s Maple Weekend in New Hampshire.

“We’re always busy,” noted gift store manager Tanya Roberts. “But Maple Weekend is when all the sugar houses are open for the first time so we get even more people. A lot of people like to sugar house hop.”

At Parker’s that means visitors can shop or eat from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. this Saturday and Sunday, and go on tours from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tours start about every 20 minutes and run 20 to 25 minutes.

“They get to see the whole process of how syrup is made from getting sap from the trees to cooking the syrup,” Roberts said.

Roberts said Parker’s still uses a wood-fire evaporator in line with the history of how maple syrup was made before many sugar shacks switched to gas.

“It’s tradition,” Roberts said. “We think it tastes better that way. But that’s just our opinion.”

This the 24th Maple Weekend in the state as part of New Hampshire Maple Producers Association Maple Sugaring Month, which runs March 9 through March 31. This is the time of year when trees are tapped and – hopefully – the sap starts to flow.

While some presenters at a recent producers conference at the University of New Hampshire said climate change is having a negative effect on the start of sap season, Roberts said this year has been typically strong at Parker’s.

“The season started about two weeks ago and is weather-dependent on the cold nights and warmer days,” she said. “But it’s been good for us. We’ve been out collecting, and we’ll be boiling all weekend making syrup.”

Here is a list of sugar shacks participating in Maple Weekend events if you are in the mood to do some sugar house hopping yourself.