Chris Rossetti
MARIENVILLE, Pa. – Many locals know that Yeany’s Maple Syrup is some of the best maple syrup around.
Now the Commonwealth does too.
This past weekend, Yeany’s Maple Syrup won a pair of awards at the 108th Pennsylvania Farm Show in Harrisburg.
The Dark Robust Syrup in plastic won first place and the Dark Robust Syrup in glass won Best in Show.
“It’s a pretty good feeling,” David Yeany, owner of Yeany’s Maple Syrup said. “Whenever you are recognized by your peers it’s a good feeling. It’s a really great thing. It’s a cool feeling. It’s something that you strive for, excellence.”
Yeany, who started Yeany’s Maple Syrup in 2004, had long thought about entering his maple syrup in the Farm Show but didn’t until last year.
“This is our second year,” Yeany said. “Last year, we only took one maple product. My wife, Zenobia, has been fortunate enough to win the Apple Pie contest blue ribbon every year at the Clarion County Fair, so she takes her pie down to the Farm Show. We said if we are going down we should take our maple product down, too. People tell us we make the best in the world, and sometimes it is nice to get that validation.”
Yeany’s Maple Syrup has received that validation at other festivals in the past including taking first at the Crawford County Fair, and it recently took second at the North American Maple Producers Association Conference in Massachusetts in October.
“We entered our dark maple syrup there and took second,” Yeany said. “We felt we stood a good chance to win some ribbons at the farm show.”
Yeany said to get the maple syrup entered on time at the farm show, he and his wife had to go down Thursday, Jan. 4, for Friday’s judging.
“To be quite honest, my stomach was tied in knots all day Friday waiting in our hotel,” Yeany said. “My wife couldn’t enter her pie until 3 p.m. Friday, so we were hanging around the hotel, and my stomach got tied in knots. I had to stop thinking about it. You don’t want to embarrass yourself.”
Yeany far from embarrassed himself.
“We entered the pie and walked over to the maple producers booth,” Yeany said. “There were a lot of people I have gotten to know there and whenever we walked in they all started clapping. I was like what is this about? They were like you got the golden ticket buddy, you got Best in Show. That’s a pretty good feeling to be acknowledged by people in your industry that you make a good product. To get that is quite an achievement in my mind and something we can be proud of. That is something no one can take away from us.”
Yeany’s Maple Syrup got a perfect score, as did three other maple products, but won on flavor.
“When there is a tie, they take whoever has the best flavor,” Yeany said. “We scored perfect on flavor and there was a note saying our flavor was outstanding.”
In addition to flavor, the other categories that Yeany was perfect in included packaging, density, and clarity.
“We always said we make good maple syrup,” Yeany said. “And our customers are always telling us how good it is, but whenever you have professional judges who feel you do that gives you a good feeling, a feeling you accomplished something and that you are worthy, that you do something good. All of our customers can’t be wrong.”
While Yeany said he never thought he would win Best in Show when he started producing maple syrup 20 years ago, he did have a friend who was a bit clairvoyant about it.
“No, no, I never thought we would win this,” Yeany said. “But I did have a friend of mine when I started making maple syrup where we were tasing it and he said this is farm-show quality syrup. I put back a bottle of that but never entered it. That was something like 15 years ago. That got me thinking about entering it, but I never got around to doing it.”
Well, he has done it now, and he has the blue ribbon to show for it
Anyone who wants a taste of the award-winning syrup can pick some up at his store in Marienville or go online to buy it at yeanysmaple.net.
