Ben Parrish and family grew up in rural Candler County, GA on a large farm. Along with his 3 brothers and 1 sister, Ben considered himself blessed to be raised in the farming life. Growing up, his family made cane syrup each fall using the same syrup kettle that we use today. After years of not making syrup, Ben caught the syrup bug again and began researching how to recreate one of his favorite childhood memories for his own family. Using his Grandfather’s syrup kettle as a starting point, he built a new syrup house on his own farm in Metter, GA.

After realizing how much joy it brought his own family, Ben began planting more sugar cane each year and cooking more batches of syrup to share with family and friends. In 2015, Parrish’s Ole Time Premium Sugar Cane Syrup was born.

In July of 2020, we lost our patriarch and founder, Ben (Benji) Parrish to Pancreatic Cancer after a long, hard battle. Adjusting to life without him has been tough for us.

With our Dad’s passing, we, his family, have joined together to continue the tradition started many years ago by our Great-Great Grandfather. There are notebooks of notes and countless hours that were spent with Dad learning just the right way (his way) to do it all. In his final months here with us, we took every chance to make sure we would be able to carry on this very special and sentimental family tradition. After all, he built this business with his own hands for his family, friends, and customers to enjoy.

The sugar cane was planted last year by our Dad as he was going through chemo. He refused to allow even cancer to stop his dream. The cane has spent the last year growing and thriving under both his, and now our, watchful eyes. We will be gathering together the last week of November to cut, grind, and create the beautiful, pure cane syrup just as our Dad did every Fall. This will be our first year without him standing beside us, but we know he will be watching over every single detail to make sure we were listening!

Michelle Parrish-Morris, Ben E. Parrish, III, Sonya Parrish-Jahn