Sugaring Season Again

Yesterday, we stared putting up buckets hoping for the first few drops of sap from the sugar maples this year. This will be the second year we sugar (though, I'm not sure if I can use sugar as a verb), and I'm very excited to see how well we do. Last year, we made just over two quarts of maple syrup of varying grades, and I hope to make at least one gallon this year.

A number of people have asked me how to produce maple syrup, and I'd thought I'd give a quick run-through of the process. Very simply, you take raw sap from the sugar maple tree (Acer saccharum)* and boil it until it reaches the consistency of syrup. You have to get the sap (tapping the tree), transport the sap to a pot or evaporator, filter our impurities, and then boil off the excess water.

*now, you can use sap from other trees, but the sugar maple has one of the highest sugar to water ratios -- about forty gallons of sap makes one gallon of syrup. By contrast, the red maple sap has much more water, making a ratio of 80:1. Still tastes the same, but takes much more work.*

For a small operation like ours up on the mountain, we have ten taps, ten 5-gal. buckets, and a few big pots that sit on the wood stoves. However, some of the larger sugaring operations in the area use taps with rubber hoses that transport sap to a collection tank, and they use a special shed with large steel pans and wood heat to evaporate the water. Some people still prefer the old galvanized metal buckets, and go around to collect the sap with their tractors.

To tap the tree, we drill a small hole through the bark into the living part of the tree, and then hammer a hollow metal tap into the hole. We hang our plastic buckets on the tap, and check them every two days (or so). After we get the sap, we filter it through cheesecloth, and then boil it in every large pot we can scavenge from the kitchen. After a few hours, we are left with warm, fresh maple syrup (and nothing compares to fresh maple syrup -- nothing).

After the maple sugar season, Trevor and I hope to tap some birches and attempt to make birch beer. Luckily, it requires most of the same equipment as maple sugaring and brewing cider or mead. I'll be sure to post our progress with both experiments.

Soon, it'll be time for mud season and prepping the garden. Until then, we'll have to settle for sugar and snow.