When you think of Pioneer Valley restaurants with long waits, Judie's certainly comes to mind; ditto Lone Wolf on a weekend morning or Eastside Grill on pretty much any evening. But the North Hadley Sugar Shack? After being foiled once by an hour-long wait at 12 p.m. last weekend, we returned at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, figuring that no reasonable person would have his or her act together that early. We figured wrong. Luckily, though, we only had to wait a half hour, and there was much to entertain us. The atmosphere is Cracker Barrel-esque: tchotkes everywhere, some hay scattered around, many rustic crafts for sale. But unlike our favorite roadside eatery, the Sugar Shack is the real deal.

The Sugar Shack takes its name from the sugarhouse on its premises, where maple trees are tapped from the end of February to the beginning of April. Then their sap is boiled down to make homemade syrup, which the Shack sells in bottles along with a variety of other maple products.

With time to kill, we made a beeline for the pastry counter, where we commandeered a "Maple Munchie" ($1.00). Filled with cream cheese and walnuts and topped with maple syrup, brown sugar and confectioner's sugar, it actually reminded us of a soft cannoli. And like its Italian "associate," just one taste left us wondering if our parents' insurance covered angioplasties after May 28. Nevertheless, in a small quantity, there is a lot to like.

We were seated shortly thereafter, and greeted by a very nice but flaky (or maybe ditzy) waitress. (She made us wait to order our food because she had to put in another table's order first-couldn't she have taken ours and put it in second? She also brought Sarah her tap water and forgot Nick's.) Sarah, who chose her beverage strictly on its hangover-reduction properties, liked her bottomless cup of coffee ($1.50) because it lacked bitterness; Nick, a coffee drinker, referred to it as "somewhere between Folgers and dishwater." Nick's orange juice ($1.50) was similarly pedestrian; for $1.50, you're better off buying a half-gallon of Florida's Natural.

Then again, almost everything else we consumed was homemade or homegrown, from the maple syrup to the strawberries (which had been grown and picked locally in the summer, then frozen on-site). Sarah's waffle with strawberries and whipped cream ($5.45) was enormous, but it was so light and fluffy that she nearly finished it.

Nick ordered a breakfast plate with two eggs, two pancakes and two strips of bacon ($5.75, or $6.75 if you want chocolate chip or fruit-topped pancakes). The eggs were scrambled lightly, as requested, but it's awfully hard to screw up scrambled eggs; these were unmemorable. The thick-cut bacon was crispier than Nick would have liked, which took away from some of the flavor (and some of the grease). We agreed that Nick's chocolate chip pancakes were the chocolateiest either of us had ever tasted. Ordinarily, that wouldn't be a problem-but if IHOP can get those chips in the pancakes, why can't the Sugar Shack?

Given the abundance of chocolate, Nick's pancakes probably didn't need the dousing of syrup. But we had come all this way to a sugarhouse (sunk cost be damned), and we were having the maple syrup. Alas, eating it where it was created doesn't change the fact that Grade A maple syrup tastes an awful lot like Grade B maple syrup (the inferior stuff is just harvested later in the season). But it's not like Grade B is Aunt Jemima, either, so unless you're a real connoisseur, maple syrup is, well, maple syrup.

Was it worth the drive (20 minutes) or the wait? Nick says no; Sarah says yes. But if you want to decide for yourself, you'd better go soon: The Shack is only open for breakfast and brunch from late February until mid-April, and this year they stop serving pancakes on April 15.