Sugaring Time of Year

[JohnyMac]

Well now I have the sugaring bug. Now since I am up around the 42 degree Lat. the weather does not lend its self to sugar making using cane or beet sugar so this leaves us here with maple sugar and/or maple syrup.

In the fall I wrapped 10 tree's sugar maple tree's with white surveyors tape.. There are four different maple type tree's in these parts and what a better thing to do then walking in the woods on a nice crisp fall day looking at different maple leaves to identify my soon to be maple syrup.

Monday of this week I started my research, thanks to the interwiz and two books I got out of the library. Upon completing my research it comes down to:

> Tapping previously identified trees,
> Collecting the sap from the tree's,
> Boiling the water off of the tree's outside,
> Finishing the boiled down sap inside to syrup, and
> Bottling/canning the finished product.

A friend of mine has been boiling off the water in the sap using an outside turkey cooker fired with propane. She complained that it took several bottles of propane to accomplish this task which costed a small fortune. It also took for ever which was most likely because she used a stew pot rather than an open flat pan like a hotel steam table pan.

Based on my research I found out that it was better to boil off the sap using an evaporator. A typical evaporator was a 20"x 36" stainless steel pan about 4-6" deep. There are actually a bunch of different size evaporators available as well as custom ones however they are a bit out of my price range ($200- $400). Thinking outside the proverbial box, I purchased two full size SS hotel pans that measured ~13"x21"x6". The add claims that one pan will old 28 quarts of liquid so 2 pans x 28 qts = 56 quarts ÷ 4 (4 quarts to a gallon)= 14 gallons. This really isn't an important number other than how much the hotel pan can hold while boiling.

Of course I do not expect to get 14 gallons from ten trees but I do expect to get ~10 finished quarts of maple syrup. We will see.

The pans arrived on Wednesday so it was time to figure out heat to boil the sap down. This process has to be done outside due to the steam that is released during the evaporation process. Keep in mind that you have to boil off 98-97% of the water before you end up with maple syrup. My first thought was to build a fire pit/place out of cinder blocks. I have enough blocks so OK I guess. Then I ran across an evaporator on YouTube that used a 55 gallon steel barrel.

With receiving the aforementioned pans on Wednesday MrsMac and I went out yesterday and bought a 55 gallon steel drum.

So far, the costs have been:
> $50- for the two 28 gauge stainless steel full size hotel pans, and
> $10- for the steel barrel.

I will post more as time approached tapping time. 

Please post idea's and your experiences sugaring here.

[Nemo]

HHMMMM, so far you have $60 into it.  Figure 10 years depreciation on the pans and barrel.  Probably go more but thats a fair assessment.  So $6 for the year. 

You end up with 2 quarts and you are ahead.  The firewood you cut, the time, trouble and effort all don't count.  Those are things to do to keep you out of trouble. 

Nemo

[Jackalope]

I use the stainless steal steaming pans on a propane turkey fryer heater, works fine for me.  I regret selling the evaporator that I had, as prices have risen considerably. I usually go through a 20lb bottle of propane to get about a gallon of syrup.  I preheat the sap on the wood stove which saves on propane.  Talking with a syrup expert yielded some interesting ideas.  He mentioned that you can also tap birch trees, which makes a much darker syrup.  When tapping a birch tree, it's necessary to tap at the very base of the tree, since the pressure of the sap is generated by the roots, unlike a maple, where the sap flows upward from the trunk to the branches.  I haven't tried it yet, but he said most types of birches can be tapped, providing the tree is large enough.

      He also made some suggestions regarding using maple sap.  He said you can make coffee and pasta using sap rather than ordinary water, which gives it an unusual taste.  He also mentioned directly drinking chilled maple sap, as it's high in various nutrients, like calcium.  I won't be tapping trees for another month probably, as it's still quite cold here.  Sugar maple trees actually have a relatively small ideal growing area, essentially from the northern Appalachians to southern Ontario/Quebec, and because of the recent annual warming trend the band is getting narrower.

[JohnyMac]

Interesting gents.