It's that time once again....

[whino-wino]

We make maple syrup about every 3 to 5 years. The reason we don't do it every year is that we usually end up making around 50 gallons and even though you give a bunch away, it still lasts quite a while.
We tapped the trees last Saturday.

There were a couple that were running, but most were still dormant. We put up about 500 bags. Most of them are pretty easy to access. We do this at my Grandma's place. There's about 260 acres that used to be woods that we cleared out when I was about 13 (I remember this well because my cousin and I did most of the work). We didn't touch any of the maples. They were all left in place just for this purpose.

This is the "syrup shed". Inside is the evaporator. Sorry, no pics of the evaporator at the moment, but I'll get some up once we start cooking.

We have a stock tank that goes on the platform on the side of the shed. This tank holds about 425 gallons. We'll fill that up and it gravity feeds into the evaporator. The evaporator has a float attached to the shut off valve so it self regulates the flow from the stock tank. We also have about 20 food grade plastic 55 gallon drums with locking lids. We'll fill all of these first before we fill the stock tank. If the trees run good we should be able to keep the tank and the barrels full for about a week. Our goal is usually to collect around 1500 - 2000 gallons of sap. It takes about 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup.


We still have more bags to put up. Put out another 200 or so this morning. We also collected from the ones we put up last Saturday. Most of the trees were dormant but many of them finally took off yesterday. We got about 90 gallons on our first collection and they haven't really even started going yet. I had brought my camera today but I needed to grab my Dad's Polaris Ranger to use for collecting sap. He lives about 1/2 mile from my Grandma and I barely made it through the trail (the snow in the woods is still quite deep). Once I got over there I realized the camera was still in my truck, so no pics today. I'll get some more up though. This whole process takes about 3 weeks and once the trees start to take off it requires daily attention.

 

[Tom]

Cool Pix!

I guess now that I see what involved in making syrup I can see why the retail is high for the "good" stuff.

 

[gaudet]

Cool Pix!

I guess now that I see what involved in making syrup I can see why the retail is high for the "good" stuff.</font>

Amen to that, I'll gladly pay a few dollars just for the hard work put into it.

 

[Wade E]

I only buy the good stuff here even though I grew up on the crappy fake stuff! I never had the good stuff until we had kids and then decided after looking at the ingredients that that stuff was trash!

 

[gaudet]

I only buy the good stuff here even though I grew up on the crappy fake stuff! I never had the good stuff until we had kids and then decided after looking at the ingredients that that stuff was trash!

Hallelujah to that one too..................

 

[grapeman]

I have never seen the bags used whino. Are they single use or what? My brother still uses buckets like Frank (AAAStinkie). Most large sugarbushes around here use tubing from tree to tree and use a vacuum system for collection to bulk transfer tanks- not quite as romantic as buckets and taps! I usually snag a couple gallons from him every year and won't use the store bought stuff!

 

[whino-wino]

I have never seen the bags used whino. Are they single use or what? My brother still uses buckets like Frank (AAAStinkie). Most large sugarbushes around here use tubing from tree to tree and use a vacuum system for collection to bulk transfer tanks- not quite as romantic as buckets and taps! I usually snag a couple gallons from him every year and won't use the store bought stuff!

The bags can be used multiple times but if you want to just use them once it isn't that big of a deal. The holders and sleeves (the metal part on top) last for years. The ones we have are the same ones we used when I was a toddler. We did buy new bags this year, but it's only like $25 for 500 of them. The bags are nice because you can store all of them in a very small space. We just seal them up with the sleeves and holders in three of the drums that we have. Not sure wherewe'd store 800 - 900 buckets.


p.s. Using the tubing system doesn't result in "real" maple syrup because you don't get all the bugs!!

 

[Bert]

Whino...that looks a lot of work, but what a great product....Do you sell any or just for your own use???

 

[gaudet]

p.s. Using the tubing system doesn't result in "real" maple syrup because you don't get all the bugs!!

That extra protein means the world to some....

 

[Waldo]

Great, "How Do They Do That" whino..Thanks for sharing and looking forward to more pictures

 

[whino-wino]

The temps were so low this past week that the trees didn't run at all. They started dripping a bit yesterday (not much) and today they did pretty well. I'm guessing we'll finally be making our second round of sap collection tomorrow. I'll do my best to remember the camera!

 

[NorthernWinos]

Thanks for sharing this thread....Very interesting.

Kind of a romantic dream...like bee keeping...[which we failed in]

There is nothing like real maple syrup...

 

[AlFulchino]

great pictures...keep'em coming..my wife wants to try this some day

 

[dragonmaster42]

Interesting the sap is clear/colorless in the bags. Does the brownish "syrup" color developasit evaporates?

 

[whino-wino]

If cooked to the proper temp, real maple syrup is quite a bit darker than the stuff you buy at the grocery store (even darker than the "real" maple syrup they sell at the grocery store). The viscosity is like water when it's hot but will be more like molasses when cold. You almost have no choice but to warm it up in order to serve it. I'm not sure why the real syrup at the store isn't as thick or dark as the stuff we make. My guess is that you have such a small window for temperature (214° - 216°) that they don't risk it. Another method for knowing when tobottle the syrup is to use a maple sugaring hydrometer. I would thinkthat's what the commercial operations do and they probably cut it off before it gets too close to being done.


When you start boiling the sap it will stay at 212° for a long, long time and gets darker and darker as the water evaporates. You have to watch the thermometer closely. We usually have a person stationed with their eyes fixed on it once the sap starts to look dark. The temp will start to rise quickly once it passes 212°. You've got approximately 2 minutes to flush out the syrup and fill the last trough of the evaporator with diluted sap before you scorch it. Scorched syrup does NOT taste good. This is why I think the commercially produced stuff is probably just a little watered down. Why risk ruining your whole batch?


Sorry for the sermon.


Anyway, I was told this morning that my cousins had gone ahead and collected all of the sap yesterday evening when I wasn't around. I was thinking that I wasn't going to get the pictures I promised, but when I got home the phone rang and my cousin Jason was on the line and told me that we must have had a good day because he just got home and some of the bags looked ready to burst. I headed down and we got to work:

(Yes, that's a Mosti All-Juice bucket he's using

)


I guess they collected about 80 gallons yesterday. Today we got just shy of 200 more. That brings us to approximately 400 total. Still got a ways to go before we start cooking, but if we have more days like today it won't be too long (forecast is for pretty cold weather though...and another foot of snow

)


Here's another pic of the shed, this time with the stock tank in place. It holds about 425 gallons:

Here's the evaporator. The main boiler in the front is missing. Well, it's not really missing, it's just missing from the pictures. We took it in to have a leak fixed. We'll get it back this Friday.

More to come later. I'm thinking the trees are going to slow down for at least the middle part of this week. Temps are supposed to be cooler and we're getting some more snow.

 

[grapeman]

The color and thus grade of the maple syrup is more a function of the time of season it comes from than how much it was boiled. Early season lightly colored syrup provides the highest grades, but generally have the lowest yield because the sap runs slower then. The later season grades are darker and more full maple flavored and are generally a bit cheaper. I prefer them myself because they taste better to me.


Syrup has two grades in the US Grade A and Grade B (although there is sometimes a grade C). Grade A is broken down into three subgrades.
They are Grade A Light Amber, Medium Amber and Dark Amber.


Vermont -being different (in more ways than you can imagine) uses a slightly different method with generally slightly more solids. They add Vermont to it and even "Fancy".


Overall, any real Maple Syrup is delicious and I enjoy it when I get the chance. All the Sugar Bushes really took a hit here in 1997 with the massive icestorm. It took the tops out of many trees and a lot of others got diseased. Finally production is almost back to normal.

 

[AlFulchino]

great pics...i will show the wife


up this-a-way i have even seen them connect the trees w a food grade tube of some type...all the way down to the roadside or sugar house....they use gravity feed and collect all at one point

 

[whino-wino]

Thanks for the info appleman. I was not aware that the color was a result of that, but if you think about it, it makes sense. The trees probably aren't producing all of the sugars right away.


I always assumed the color was due to not wanting to risk scorching.

 

[nursejohn]

Hey wino, those pictures are great. To an ole Texas boy, this all seems pretty interesting. Wish I could taste that syrup on a hot stack of pancakes. Keep up the good work.

 

[whino-wino]

More pics....


To say that the sap was running good yesterday was an understatement

The "Sap-Mobile"

That's a 300 gallon tank on the back. We got about 180 gallons yesterday. We'll use a submersable pump to transfer it to 55 gallon drums.


You might notice by comparing to the earlier pics, we got a little bit of snow this week.