[gentle orchestral fanfare]
♪
[resonant strings lead
building orchestration]
[stream gurgling]
♪
(male narrator)
Welcome to "Our State,"
a production of UNC-TV
in association
with "Our State" magazine--
for over 75 years
bringing readers
the wonders of North Carolina.
On this edition,
Join
the colorful
excitement
that grips
Grove Park Inn
each year with
gingerbread...
follow
Billy Barnes
for an
inside taste
of Cheerwine...
and see real North
Carolina maple syrup
being made at
Maple Creek Farm.
♪
[gentle piano melody]
(male announcer)
Since 1872,
BB&T has been supporting
the people and communities
of North Carolina.
From our small-town roots
to the banking network
you see today,
we've always been here
for all our clients,
stretching from Manteo
to Murphy.
We're proud
of our heritage
and to call
North Carolina home,
and we're very proud
to provide funding
for "Our State."
♪
Quality public television
is made possible
through the financial
contributions
of viewers like you,
who invite you to join them
in supporting UNC-TV.
[plucked strings interlude]
♪
[piano leads]
(male narrator)
There's something sweet
going on at Asheville's
Grove Park Inn.
People have come
from miles around--
treasures in hand--
works created with love.
Edible art,
you might say,
from the small and hopeful...
to the most elaborate,
each one a unique
creative experience.
Got your
papers?
(narrator)
Folks have been
working for months
on the design and construction
of their entries.
(woman)
Never having been
an architectural student,
I'm...
rather tickled.
Is this us,
right here?
(narrator)
And now they're ready...
or mostly ready.
(woman)
Guess what I forgot?
My snow!
Oh, well.
(narrator)
So let the day begin
at the 17th Annual
Grove Park Inn National
Gingerbread House Competition.
What you'll do is
come in here--
take the elevator
up to the next floor.
(man)
That's awesome, guys!
(woman)
And you'll go to your right.
They'll take a picture.
(male photographer)
Look right at my camera--
one, two, three.
[camera clicking]
And that looks great;
thank you very much.
(woman)
And then you'll go
into the ballroom.
(man)
We've got over 20 states
registered, actually,
this year
in our competition.
We've got folks coming
from upstate New York,
folks coming
from Wisconsin.
In the past,
we've had folks register
from as far away as Oregon.
My snowman fell down!
(narrator)
It's not unusual
for mishaps to occur
during transportation,
but the Grove Park Inn
has that base covered--
a clinic of sorts
for gingerbread houses
that have experienced
difficulties en route.
(woman)
This is my first one--
hence the giant crack.
We made it
all the way to...
a bridge on I-40
with all the potholes
when it went
"krk-khk" and fell!
(narrator)
Finally, all is well,
and a train of repaired
gingerbread houses
heads off
for the ballroom.
[woodwinds ascending]
Except that some of them
don't exactly...
look like houses.
(boy)
Mine's supposed to be
a battle
between 1880-something
and 1990-something.
And these are like
spaceship thingies.
(narrator)
Hmm...imagination's
the thing here,
and as long as
you can eat it and it's not more
than two feet by two feet
by two feet, well...
the rest
is up to you.
Camping scene
with different stuff.
(narrator)
Here's one that should
look familiar
to UNC-TV viewers;
it's Cupola House.
(woman)
In Edenton--'cause I made
my husband drive and see it
after we saw it
in "Our State" magazine.
It took me forever,
cuttin' out
all those little
pieces of siding
and sticking that
on there.
[plucked strings
lead dainty arrangement]
(Davis)
We have
four different categories
in our competition
this year.
My hands
are shaking.
(Davis)
We have our adult category,
which is 18 and up.
♪
We have our teen category,
which is 13 through 17.
[glockenspiel joins]
We have our youth category,
which is 9 through 12...
and then we have
our child category,
which is five-
through eight-year-olds.
(narrator)
It's astonishing to consider
how much time
these sugar artists
may have put in their work--
often many months.
Andrea Jost from Raleigh
has been planning
her project since summer
and began building in earnest
around the first of September.
(Jost)
I collect pop-up books,
and I have many,
so I thought that would be
a good inspiration
to do something
that's different.
And I haven't actually seen
anybody doing a pop-up book.
The book is
"The Night Before Christmas,"
so you'll have, um,
a chimney coming out here
and a Christmas tree
and Santa standing there.
And you're going to have
"a night before Christmas"
written on the pages,
hopefully.
The most important parameter
is that the main structure
is constructed
out of gingerbread.
That doesn't mean
it has to taste good,
so you can use
raw spaghettis,
and any kind of food item
that you could find
in a pantry can be used,
but you're not allowed
to use any support
like Styrofoam or wood.
I have seen the judges
actually walking around
with little knives, poking.
So they will check.
[piano leads
dainty arrangement]
I think one of the things
that are really important
is to have
a lot of detail...
and to have
very clean craftsmanship.
So you see these houses,
and they look
like they're made out
of some other material,
not gingerbread and icing.
Everything is perfect.
(narrator)
Perfection begins,
at least for Andrea,
in the kitchen,
where ordinary tools
and ingredients
plus her imagination
combine to create
something extraordinary.
I basically use
gingerbread dough
that's pretty much
like regular gingerbread dough
that you would make
if you wanna
actually eat the house.
What I do is leave out
the baking powder
so the dough won't rise.
Bake it at a lower temperature
for a little bit longer.
That'll be stiffer
and less likely to bend.
[glockenspiel interlude]
So once it's out of the oven
and it's cooled off,
you can see that it's
a pretty sturdy piece.
A lot of people use glazes or,
like I do, fondant on top,
so that'll preserve
the dough.
(narrator)
Andrea also cuts out
some reindeer and leaf shapes
to test in the oven.
One of Andrea's
most creative brainstorms
was how to put
all 14 verses
of Clement Moore's poem
on her pages.
It just popped
in my head-- alphabet pasta.
[oboe leads
calm arrangement]
♪
(narrator)
She presses
each letter into fondant,
a commercial dough that comes
in a variety of colors
and is used as a cake
and pastry filling.
Some of the work Andrea does
is extremely delicate...
(Jost)
I think I could be
a brain surgeon.
(narrator)
...and obviously fun!
(Jost)
That's my little boot.
(narrator)
Creating each piece
can be quite laborious,
but it's clearly
a labor of love.
Of course,
she wants the judges
to love her creation too.
Think that's
a tree?
(Davis)
Each of our judges
are required
to look at creativity...
[plucked strings
lead dainty arrangement]
consistency of theme...
[glockenspiel
punctuating arrangement]
difficulty in precision...
♪
and then we have
originality.
(narrator)
Which ones will win?
What's your favorite?
Imagine having to decide!
(woman)
Well, it was
a little overwhelming.
We were back there
choking each other!
"You need to vote
for this one--I insist!"
Hah, hah, hah!
(narrator)
Another consideration
is how to get
an elaborate structure like this
to survive the long trek
to Asheville.
That's something Andrea
has been thinking about
as she surveys the pieces
all laid out
on her table in Raleigh.
So, I will put up
all the pages
with their backs together,
and then, little by little,
I will put on,
like, the house.
Once the page is up,
I can put the roof
against the page.
Same with all
the other pieces,
like the Christmas tree,
but I'm going to stand it up
and take it standing.
I think that's--
that's the plan for now.
♪
(narrator)
Excitement builds
throughout the day
as the judges
wrap up their work.
(Davis)
Ladies and gentlemen,
thank you so much
for joining us
for the 17th Annual
National Gingerbread House
Competition.
(narrator)
Each of the four groups
of contestants
are on the edge
of their seats
at the awards ceremony
to see who will be
the ten semifinalists...
(emcee)
Now to round out the top ten--
(narrator)
...and then the
three winners
in each
category.
(Davis)
Let's give one more
round of applause
to all our
youth top-ten
winners.
[applause]
(male emcee)
We'd like to present
our top three
prizewinners
in the teen
category.
♪
(Davis)
Ladies and
gentlemen,
our top ten
winners in our
adult division.
(narrator)
It's difficult to comprehend
the emotional investment
each contestant has put
into their project.
[plucked strings
lead dainty arrangement]
But one contestant
is noticeably absent.
Back in Raleigh,
Andrea now contemplates
the ultimate disaster
when her hard work
unexpectedly
came tumbling down
in the blink
of a reindeer's eye.
(Jost)
I was starting
to put it together
when two of the big pages
just couldn't stand up.
They were all going to be
standing up like that,
and they did, but then
two just broke in half.
It rained
for five days straight,
and even though the fondant
on top is very stiff,
the gingerbread
in the middle
just started to become
very soggy and moist.
So moisture and gingerbread
are just not good friends.
(Davis)
And this year's
grand prizewinner
in the National
Gingerbread House Competition
is entry 2387 from Polkville,
North Carolina.
[cheering and applause]
♪
I'm shocked right now.
Last year I got in the top ten
for the first time,
so I'm just
shocked to be here!
hah, hah
(narrator)
The winning entries
are put on display
throughout
the Grove Park Inn
for a while,
and some in town as well
to perhaps inspire someone
thinking about
competing next year.
♪
It won't be long before
the old creative juices
will begin flowing again.
And maybe...
the next one will be more
than you ever dared to dream.
[arrangement concludes
with fluttering melody]
[sauntering piano interlude]
♪
[bouncy guitar
and piano tune]
It's as Southern
as Krispy Kreme
doughnuts
and MoonPies.
It's been around
since 1917,
and it gets its mail
right here in Salisbury.
♪
It's that fizzy,
ruby-red elixir
known as "Cheerwine."
Cheerwine's name comes from
its cherry/almond flavor.
Strictly speaking,
it's not wine at all.
It's a nonalcoholic,
noninebriating soda pop
that has been tingling
North Carolina tongues
since the days
when Woodrow Wilson
occupied the White House.
Like rubber tires,
Velcro,
and a whole lot
of this world's babies,
Cheerwine was born
by accident.
In the years
before World War I,
a tiny bottling company
in Salisbury
was selling a drink
called "Mint Cola."
During the war,
a severe sugar shortage
threatened to shut down
the business.
The company's worried owner,
Mr. L.D. Peeler,
was pacing the floor
when a traveling
salesman dropped by
and convinced Peeler
to try a cherry flavoring
that was every bit
as sweet as sugar.
[twittering flute leads
building arrangement]
Sure enough,
the result was a drink
that offered
a tasty alternative to cola.
Soon the company was churning
out bottles of Cheerwine
in a building that had been
a whiskey distillery
before the days
of prohibition.
[plucked strings
lead perky arrangement]
(man)
One thing that we try
not to change
is our formula.
Packaging has changed
tremendously.
Of course, we started with
six-ounce returnable bottle
back in 1917,
and then 1957,
they came out
with a king-size,
eight-ounce bottle,
which we think's
pretty funny now.
And then soon after that,
everything was returnable.
We came out
with 16-ounce returnables,
32-ounce returnables,
and then cans
were invented in the '60s.
In the '70s,
plastic started coming out.
We got bigger sizes.
We started with 64 ounce,
and now we have
2-liter plastic,
and our industry does
a good job of recycling.
♪
(Barnes)
The Cheerwine folks
are well aware
that they're selling
a legendary brand of soda pop,
and they feed the legend
with a colorful line
of Cheerwine collector items.
You can shop for them online,
but it's more fun
to admire the real stuff
at the old-fashioned
Innes Street Drug store
in downtown Salisbury.
Inside the store,
there's an amazing array
of Cheerwine collectibles
old and new--
several generations
of clocks...
delightful old posters,
T-shirts,
sweatshirts, golf bags,
golf balls,
windbreakers,
and on and on!
Behind the counter, there's
that churning slushy machine,
delighting
the tiny tongues
of a new generation
of Cheerwine fans.
[clarinet slide
introduces musical pause]
♪
Across town
at Cheerwine headquarters,
the magic begins
in a locked, windowless room
where trusted employees
follow a secret family formula
to create the syrupy
Cheerwine base.
The concentrated mix
is stored in a 3,000-gallon
stainless steel tank,
then funneled into
5-gallon jugs for shipment
to seven bottling companies
spread over
six southern states.
[percussion
introduces industrious theme]
♪
Each jug holds
enough base concentrate
to make 30,000
12-ounce servings
of Cheerwine.
The Cheerwine folks own
this operation in Charlotte.
♪
Concentrate is mixed with
sweetener and purified water
then squirted into cans
and bottles.
Two-liter bottles
spew forth
at a rate
of 350 per minute.
♪
Cheerwine cans are filled
at a rate of 1,200 per minute.
♪
Then they move
to the warehouse
to be loaded
onto trucks
bound for your
neighborhood grocery
and convenience stores.
♪
From a marketing
point of view,
Cheerwine has what you might
call a "split personality."
There's a huge body
of mature-aged customers
who've grown up with
Cheerwine as a way of life.
But what about the younger
"Twitter generation"?
(man)
The Cheerwine brand
doesn't take itself
all that seriously.
The target consumer
that we're trying to reach
is a young person,
roughly 18 to 24.
And so if a brand today wants
to try to reach this target,
you've gotta have a presence
through the Internet.
We've created videos that
we place on our Web site
such as
"Tales from the Fridge"
where Cheerwine
is in the refrigerator
and he's solving issues
for other products
that are in the refrigerator.
Jelly, we're all on
the same team here.
(Jelly)
Oh, see Broccoli, I think
he's turning bad, man.
(Cheerwine)
Ah, he's just going through
a rough patch, that's all.
[Spanish guitar riff]
(Barbitta)
We have consumers
all over the country,
some international consumers
who will order Cheerwine
because it
tastes like home.
We have servicemen and women
over in Afghanistan and Iraq
who we hear from regularly.
We particularly take care
of the service people,
and if we can't
send them product
because it's hard to ship
to where they are,
we'll send them
a T-shirt.
(Barnes)
Cheerwine...
a classic palate pleaser
whose fame continues to grow.
(Barbitta)
But beyond what it does
on our tongue,
we're marketing and selling
a true passion brand
that people
throughout the Southeast
really identify with.
We think we're the last
soft drink company in America
still run by the same family
that founded it,
and when you have
a brand like Cheerwine
that is still
being discovered,
yet it has this authentic
backstory of 92 years,
I think that goes a long
way with consumers today.
(male vocalists)
♪ It's time for Cheerwine
♪
♪ Gotta have that Cheerwine
♪
♪ Cheerwine ♪
[fizzing]
[ambling banjo interlude]
♪
[stream gurgling]
[crowing]
(male narrator)
It's a late winter's day
on a small mountain farm
near Burnsville,
the kind of day
that gets your hopes up,
despite the lingering snow.
And the sap is rising--
a sure sign
of approaching spring
as it drips from the tap
on this maple tree.
Sap from a maple tree...
in North Carolina?
You bet!
Welcome to Maple Creek Farm,
our state's only commercial
producer of real maple syrup.
It all started
a few years ago
when John Swann bought a
piece of mountain property here
that he thought would be
a great place to retire...
someday.
(Swann)
I had the idea
we could get
a farm going up here,
and so I advertised
for a farm manager
and came upon
Richard and Molly.
Richard has
a master's degree
in forestry from Duke,
and one of the first things
he did is hike
up and down the mountains
and just scope out everything
we have on the farm.
He came and said,
"We got massive amounts
of maple trees--"
sugar maple trees.
"Why don't we try
doing some syrup?"
So, uh, this here is a--
what's called a bucket tap,
and this tree
is the closest tree
to the house.
And it also gets
southern sun,
so when the sun comes up
in the morning,
if this tree's runnin',
I know to expect
all the other trees
to start runnin'
(Swann)
The challenge that was always
in the mountains down
here is, you can't get the sap
down to the evaporator
very easily.
Up north,
you could get a sleigh
and a horse
through the woods
'cause your grades
were not bad,
but up here
with rocks and trees,
we tried the first year with
buckets; it was a disaster.
There's nothing like carrying
two five-gallon buckets
of sap down a rocky hill
in the mud
to convince you real quick
that's not feasible
on any kind of scale.
(narrator)
After studying techniques
now being used in Vermont,
Richard rigged
a system of tubes
that lets gravity
do all the work,
getting the sap
down the mountain
to collecting tanks.
(Sanders)
This black line is
what we call our "main line,"
and it is hanging
on ten-gauge, high-tensile,
electric fence wire, um.
So we probably
got two miles of this--
this is what really transports
all of our sap.
Then we, uh, bought some
of this blue tubing.
It's food-grade,
maple sap tubing,
and it's flexible,
and we run it
from tree to tree.
What we're looking for
in a tappable tree
is something with a big,
healthy crown, uh,
somethin' bigger than
12 inches, in general, uh.
But what
we're actually doing is,
we're gonna take
a drill bit
and drill in
and sever the vascular cells
that are moving liquid
up and down through the tree,
and, uh, then we stick
in this little, uh, tap here,
hammer it in tight,
and let it seal
around the outside
of that hole
so that any liquid in there
backs up and runs out--
runs out through
this little plastic tap
into our tubing system.
When it warms up
to a nice, warm day--
say, 40, 45, 50, uh,
sap begins to move up
the tree trunk, but, uh,
it needs a freezing night
to make
the tree trunk contract
and push the sap back down
into the root systems.
So what we really want
is a 20-degree night
to a 50-degree day
every day for a week.
We're collecting sap
from maybe 400 trees
on the property,
and we've strung
about four miles of tubing,
and we
collect it here.
The sap--
especially in warm weather,
sap will spoil
pretty quick, uh.
There are bacteria that like
to eat the sugar, uh,
so the best thing
for us to do
is to turn it into syrup
just as fast as we can.
You wanna bring me an armload
of bigger stuff, Richard?
[wood clattering]
(narrator)
And that's when another bit
of New England technology
is put to good use--
an evaporator that stands
in all
its stainless steel glory
one level below
the storage tanks.
(Sanders)
It's kind of hard to find
one of these things
in North Carolina.
John and I drove
to New Hampshire, uh,
after our first year
of production,
and then we decided
it was worth investing
in this, uh, really, very
specialized piece of equipment.
This whole unit's called
a continuous-flow evaporator.
That runs
from our storage tank
into this copper pipe,
and it's gonna be at, uh,
close to freezing, usually,
when we start up.
And it runs
back and forth
through these copper pipes
here, um,
and all these pipes
are bathed in hot steam.
[crackling]
(narrator)
Once the fire
gets fully cranked,
the sap can be boiling
in about 20 minutes
but then takes
constant attention
to both the fire
and the condition of the sap.
As the sap winds its way
back and forth
through
the evaporator channels,
it gets sweeter and sweeter--
from 2% sugar
at the start
to 67% sugar
after most of the water
is evaporated.
At its peak,
the water evaporates
at the rate
of 40 gallons an hour.
It will be
several hours now
before the pure maple syrup
is ready to be drawn off
in small batches.
John's goal
is to make Maple Creek Farm
financially self-sufficient,
so maple syrup is only one
of their enterprises.
There's always
a dozen or so
of these plump
characters around
to assure a steady supply
of popular pork products.
(Swann)
We do, uh,
pastured pork and lamb,
as well as, uh,
sorghum syrup, uh,
as well as maple syrup
and seasonal vegetables,
and a little bit
of apple cider.
(narrator)
These Dorper sheep
are well suited
to mountain life.
[bleating]
(woman)
The Dorper sheep were--
were bred specifically
for meat production
and, uh,
have a really rich,
mild meat.
And they do really well
on poor-quality pasture,
which we have a lot of--heh!
(Sanders)
So we raise 'em for lamb,
to produce up to six lambs
per ewe every two years.
So we have
about 30 ewes now,
and we breed 'em
in the fall,
and we lamb 'em
in the spring.
And then we'll start selling
lamb meat this fall.
(narrator)
Back at the evaporator,
the first batch
of syrup is ready.
(Swann)
Yep!
(Sanders)
We're there, OK.
We're gonna draw off.
We're just gonna crack
that valve a little bit.
Let it pour on out.
(narrator)
This process of drawing off
a small amount at a time
continues until there's
a practical amount
to be bottled.
[ambling banjo tune]
Maple Creek Farm defies
the "bigger is better"
idea of farming.
Their success
is measured in demand
for fresh-from-the-farm,
locally grown products
of superior quality.
Maple syrup in spring
and sorghum syrup in the fall
are sold
at local farmer's markets
and are available directly
from the farm as well.
(Swann)
Increasingly,
in this market,
the consumer likes to know
where their food comes from.
They like to go to market
each week and know the farmer
and know the story
behind the food.
There's a comfort in knowing
where your food comes from
and the conditions
under which it was grown.
(narrator)
So if you want the real thing,
right here
is where to find it.
And we hear
it goes pretty well
with some of that
homegrown sausage too.
[stream gurgling]
[bouncy trumpet
and clarinet tune]
♪
♪
♪
Caption Editors
Erin Gibbs and Will Halman
Caption Perfect, Inc.
www.CaptionPerfect.com
♪
(male announcer)
To subscribe
to "Our State" magazine,
visit the Web
site www.ourstate.com or call...
[gentle piano melody]
From the time BB&T
opened its doors in 1872
in the town of Wilson,
we've supported the people and
communities of North Carolina
from the Outer Banks
to the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Our long history of service
makes us North Carolina's
oldest bank.
We're proud
of this distinction,
and we're also very proud
to provide funding
for "Our State."
Quality public television
is made possible
through the financial
contributions
of viewers like you,
who invite you to join them
in supporting UNC-TV.
♪