Driving Vermont’s roads regularly breeds a familiarity with certain landmarks. Some are well known and universally accepted, such as distinctive buildings or a body of water. Then there are your landmarks that you’d use for directions with a local, but perhaps not an out of towner. Say, the gorilla holding up a VW bug on Route 7 in Leicester, the Prayer Rock in Bristol or the Whales Tails on Interstate 89. There is also a category of lanmarks you drive by that for some folks are just part of the scenery, but represent notable geographic markers on your journey. Driving on Route 7 I always crane my head to see Ollie the Camel in Ferrisburgh or gauge the progress on the endless roadside construction between Marshfield and Danville on Route 2. Finally there’s the category of landmarks that you recognize, but don’t know their back story. Maybe an old falling down house or an abandoned business, a bus that’s found its last resting place, or an eclectic collection of carved animals in someone’s yard.
Taylord Farm on Route 22A in Benson has always been one of these last places for me. Heading to Fair Haven or New York I often glance over and wonder what the history of the farm is. It serves as an important mental marker for where I am in my trip, but then depending on my direction, vanishes from my thoughts as I think about the giant squirrel outside the G & L General Store in Benson or wonder if anything is happening at the Devil’s Bowl in West Haven.
After eating one of Willie T’s Pretty Healthy and Tasty (PHAT) Cookies, I now know that in addition to breeding horses, this is the birth place of Willie’s cookies. Willie T makes a large, dense cookie. If you’re craving an energy bar, but only see cookies in sight, grab one of these. The “pretty healthy” portion of the slogan speaks to this tasting, well, pretty healthy. The cookies are chewy, with a texture edging slightly towards a muffin, lightly baked and filling. The raisins stood out more than the oatmeal and if you were offering truth in advertising might say, Pretty Healthy and Reasonably Tasty.
Verdict: More energy bar than cookie, this was a filling snack that didn’t quite do it for us.
Made at Tylord Farm in Benson, check out the full slate of Willie’s cookie offerings.
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