Rendering Sweetness

Drip . . . drip . . . drip went your taps, time to collect.  One tap on a good day could give up to one gallon of sap.  So you'll probably be out every day or every other day collecting.  If there was freezing temperatures the night before, lucky you!  You can remove the ice chunk.  It will be mostly water with little sugar content.  Bring the ice inside, let it melt and enjoy a very refreshing drink of maple filtered water.

If you have more than one or two taps then you'll want to boil off the sap outside.  You could choose to use the old fashioned cauldron over an open fire or you can build a small furnace to contain and focus the heat.

Give yourself a good amount of time to reduce the sap.  One firing of about 9 gallons of sap took a little over 5 hours to reduce.

Next filter the syrup, trust me you'll want to do this while the syrup is still warm.  Also, the felt gets clogged very quickly,  make sure you have enough material to shift about to let the syrup run through.  And yes, use felt.  I tried to use cotton but the sediment still got through the weave.  While the sediment is edible, it is not pleasant looking or all that palatable.

As the sugar season continues, you'll see the difference in the grades of your syrup.  The lighter the syrup the higher the grade.  Shown on the left is my Grade A Medium Amber through to Grade B. There are some maple syrup aficionados who prefer the strong maple flavor of the darker grades.  There are others who would use the Grade B as a molasses substitute.  Now go make some pancakes!