MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — A Vermont couple thought they were getting a sweet deal on real Vermont maple syrup when they found a good price for it on the Internet.
The man selling it told them he was a trucker from Rhode Island who passed through Vermont and that he would meet them in Brattleboro to give them their syrup, said Henry Marckres, a maple specialist with the Vermont Agency of Agriculture.
Turns out the syrup they bought wasn’t real at all, officials say. Tests show it was pure cane sugar.
It didn’t take long for the couple from Vermont — the largest producer of maple syrup in the country— to discern a phony.
The taste wasn’t quite right, Marckres said. It looked like syrup, but was too light in color to be labeled as Grade B syrup, which is dark, said Marckres.
“It was sweet, but it had no maple flavor at all,” he said.
To protect the purity of Vermont’s signature crop and to dissuade others from passing off fake maple syrup for the real thing — which sells for about $50 a gallon — Vermont’s two U.S. senators have co-sponsored a bill that would make it a felony to sell fake maple syrup.
 
 
 
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