Coombs Family Farms » Home Life

Father’s Day Gift Guide

blog — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 22:40:38 +0000

A Duluth canvas backpack and easy to pack hammock.

An Orvis Gift Card he can use towards fishing gear or a getaway (maybe he’ll take you!).

Headphones for his commute aboard public transportation.

…and for this extra special man a 32 ounce jug (pack of 2) of Coombs Family Farms 100% Pure Organic Maple Syrup Grade B.

Cabin Fever

blog — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 23:31:12 +0000

The words “maple syrup” fall so easily in line with words such as breakfast, snow, New England, and cabins. When pouring that golden goodness on your pancakes or waffles (oatmeal or french toast…) does your imagination ever take off to a cabin set back in the woods? The kind with piles of wool blankets, Adirondack Chairs or just any old comfortable wooden chairs on the porch, a stone fireplace, and trees and grass as far as you can see? A dirt road taking you further off the main path to a remote location where cards are played by candlelight and fireflies can be spotted as easily as the constellations with no light pollution to hide them. There is an innocence and sense of adventure there. A place where you are a child again and a plate piled high with pancakes, fresh blueberries, and maple syrup is going to get you through the next several hours of hiking, swimming, chopping wood, snowshoeing, fishing, and any other old thing you feel like doing. Time stops and families sit down to share a homemade meal. This is one of the places maple syrup belongs.

Top photo unknown. Middle photo weheartit. Bottom photo Dunton Hot Springs.

Sustainable Way of Life

blog — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 15:36:03 +0000

As a child, traveling with my father from shop to shop distributing our maple syrup was a treat. The father and son time, the adventure, and the casual meetings with farmers and customers who made my family’s livelihood possible. Being able to walk into the woods and check taps during sugaring season, help close friends carry syrup in metal buckets from their trees into their sugarhouse, and to to taste our results with a table of delicious food and grateful recipients. I continue to be inspired by this way of life. The pleasure each season brings and the opportunity I have at Coombs to foster a learning environment for sustainability.

Coombs Family Farms is committed not just to the future of small family farms, but also to the future and health of our forests and environment. We tap conservatively, and do not use pesticides. My grandfather, Robert Sr., always said, “There are no shortcuts to creating pure maple syrup – we do right by the forest and it’ll do right by you.”

To this day, Coombs Family Farms still works with many of the same maple trees my great, great-grandparents once tapped. Some of the trees are now more than 300 years old, one nearly 20 feet in circumference.

Photo Bascom Family Archives.