Strange things happen in February. A groundhog in Philly emerges from his den with great trepidation to flashbulbs and sudden cult celebrity. Schoolchildren don beards and hats made from black construction paper. Men are forced to buy chocolates in heart-shaped boxes or face the prospect of never having sex again.
And in Missouri, it’s maple sugaring season. The combination of above-freezing temperatures by day and below-freezing ones by night churns up the sap inside maple trees. At Wildwood’s Rockwoods Reservation (2751 Glencoe Road, 636.458.2236), they celebrate this process with the annual Maple Sugar Festival, this year held on Feb. 6 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
The free party’s all about tapping maple trees, boiling sap and sampling sweet treats. Attendees take guided hikes, and the guides explain and demonstrate the process; park workers, meanwhile, show how American colonists created tasty products from maple sap by cooking it down in giant copper kettles over an open fire (it takes about 40 hours to go from sap to syrup). Visitors can also sample “sugar on snow,” the all-natural original snow cone, made with – you guessed it – maple syrup and clean snow.
Visitors are often surprised at the distinctive taste of the real maple sugar and maple syrup at the festival, noted Rockwoods Reservation naturalist Anna-Lisa Tucker. “Usually the common store brands we eat now are made from high-fructose corn syrup,” she said. “A lot of people think that’s real maple syrup when in fact it’s not.”
– Byron Kerman
This article appears in Jan 1-31, 2010.