Best American-Made Maple Syrup & Honey: Single-Farm Syrup, Raw Honey and What Is Imported

Maple syrup is one of the few foods that can be American from the tree to the bottle, and the surest way to get that is to buy from a farm that taps its own woods. Crown Maple was established in 2010 at Madava Farms, an 800-acre organic farm in Dover Plains, in New York's Hudson Valley, owned by Robb and Lydia Turner. The company calls its syrup "estate-produced" at that farm, in amber, dark and very dark grades.

Branon Family Maple Orchards has made syrup in Fairfield, Vermont for six generations. Tom and Cecile Branon now hand-tap about 90,000 trees across 4,800 acres and boil in a sugarhouse built in 2014 with two oil-fired evaporators. The farm calls itself a single-sourced producer, and its About page says all the products it sells are made there by the family. Its syrup has been certified organic since 2003. We list its Maple to Go! travel pouches.

Nova Maple Syrup started as Jake Leveto's 50-tap hobby in 2013. He and Hailee bought a 100-acre property in Hartstown, in northwest Pennsylvania, in 2015 and ran their first commercial season in 2016. Nova says its syrup comes from its own hardwood forests and ships straight from its sugar shack. It also makes maple sugar and maple cream. Sapsquatch is Nova's certified-organic line, from the same Hartstown address, inspected by MOSA to USDA organic standards. One packaging note from Nova: its gallon jug supplier was sold to a Canadian company, so the jug may not be US-made even when the syrup is.

Several good syrups blend the brand's own sap with syrup bought from neighbors. That is still American maple, but the label may not name one farm or one state.

Runamok makes its syrup at its facility in Fairfax, Vermont, from its own organic sugarbush and from more than 30 Vermont family farms. Laura and Eric Sorkin began tapping in 2009 and launched the brand in 2016. Lincoln County Reserve, a family operation in Merrill, Wisconsin, says it has made syrup for over 100 years and taps 2,000 acres of its own trees in northern Wisconsin, but it also buys from sugarhouses across Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan.

Coombs Family Farms of Brattleboro, Vermont is the largest buyer on this list. The family says it has tapped trees in Vermont since the mid-1800s, but most of what it sells comes "from over 3,000 small family farms." Coombs keeps a separate pure Vermont syrup collection from its organic collection, and it does not say where the farms behind the organic syrup are. Of the five Coombs syrups we list, only the 32 oz Organic Amber listing says Vermont. We found nothing pointing to syrup from outside the US. If Vermont matters to you, buy a Coombs bottle that says Vermont on the label.

Flavored syrups start from the same maple, then add smoke, a barrel or a spice. Smoke and barrels add nothing imported. Spices usually do.

Sugar Bob's Finest Kind in Chester, Vermont began with Rob "Sugar Bob" Hausslein, who has sugared in the Vermont woods for over 40 years, and a syrup smoked with real hardwood smoke. The company says everything it makes starts in Vermont. It sells the smoked syrup in 8.45 oz and 32 oz bottles and has added maple sriracha and barbecue sauces built on Vermont maple.

Runamok smokes its Pecan Wood Smoked syrup on site in Fairfax, and its only ingredient is maple syrup smoked with pecan wood. Its Cinnamon-Vanilla Infused syrup is bottled in Fairfax too, but Runamok says the cinnamon comes from Vietnam and the vanilla beans from Madagascar. Crown Maple's Bourbon Barrel Aged syrup is produced in the Hudson Valley. Its Madagascar Vanilla and Cinnamon syrups start from the estate syrup and add spices that are not grown in New York.

If you want a bottle with nothing in it but American maple, buy a plain grade or a smoked syrup. The infused bottles are made here with some imported flavorings.

Pure Southern Honey is a family beekeeping business in Du Pont, Georgia that has harvested honey from thousands of hives for generations, selling in bulk and renting hives for pollination before it began selling jars. The company says its honey comes only from its own hives and is not mixed with honey from other sources. The bees work mostly Gallberry, a shrub native to the Southeast, with some Tupelo, Blackgum and Palmetto. It sells raw, unfiltered, unheated honey and comb honey.

The Honey Jar in Ogden, Utah began in 2005, when 17-year-old Kyle Kanno sold whipped honey at county fairs. Since 2008 it has bottled raw honey from beekeepers in the Intermountain West. Its honey sticks are labeled "Manufactured with US Honey in Ogden, Utah by a family company," and its raw clover and Utah wildflower honeys are packed in Ogden. Its California wildflower and orange blossom pages do not say where that honey was produced.

Kline Honey Bee Farm keeps bees on a 34-acre working century farm in Rootstown, Ohio. The products we list from it are beeswax, not honey: a 1 oz bar rendered from wax made by the farm's own bees, and a set of beeswax meditation candles, both described as made in Ohio.

A honey company can pack honey in the US that bees made somewhere else, and the label is the only way to tell.

Bee Harmony is sold by Barkman Honey, a Midwest family company with beekeeping roots dating to 1928. Its American Raw honeys, Wildflower, Clover, Berry Blossom, Orange Blossom and Buckwheat, carry "Product of U.S.A." on their product pages, and so do the Classic and Coast-to-Coast honey flight gift sets. The clover comes from the Dakotas, Montana and other Midwest states. Bee Harmony's Brazilian Raw Organic and Eucalyptus honeys read "Product of Brazil Packed in the U.S.A." and its Hungarian Raw Acacia reads "Product of Hungary Packed in the U.S.A." The jars we list are American Raw.

Fischer's Honey, started by Raymond Fischer in his kitchen in 1935, runs what it calls the largest and oldest honey processing and packing plant in Arkansas. That is a claim about packing, not where the honey was harvested. Its organic honey is Brazilian. Of the three Fischer's bottles we list, the 24 oz raw honey listing says US honey; the 40 oz raw and 40 oz clover listings carry no origin line.

Melville Candy makes honey spoons, along with lollipops and hot cocoa stirrers, at its factory in Randolph, Massachusetts, a family business opened in 1978. It says every product is hand-made, packed and inspected in the USA, but it does not say where its honey comes from.

Start with the word pure. Pure maple syrup is boiled-down sap and nothing else. Pancake or table syrup is usually corn syrup with flavoring, and it is a different product.

Then pick a grade by taste, not quality. Every grade of pure syrup is Grade A now, sorted by color: Golden or Amber for a lighter, delicate taste on pancakes, Dark for a stronger maple flavor that holds up in baking and glazes, and Very Dark for cooking. Grade A Dark is what used to be sold as Grade B, as Lincoln County Reserve notes on its listings. Once opened, keep maple syrup in the refrigerator.

For honey, read the origin line before the brand story. "Product of U.S.A." means American honey. "Packed in the U.S.A." on its own can mean imported honey bottled here, as Bee Harmony's Hungarian and Brazilian jars show. A blank origin line tells you nothing either way. Raw and unfiltered means the honey was not heated or fine-filtered, so it keeps more pollen and wax and will usually crystallize sooner. Crystallized honey is not spoiled: set the jar in warm water and it will liquefy again. Keep honey at room temperature with the lid tight; the refrigerator speeds up crystallization.