Maple Days: Day 7

Jack Wax. I like to think some poor guy named Jack fell asleep as he was finishing off some syrup. He wakes up, rushing over to find his syrup has boiled over. Catastrophe! Syrup everywhere, a sticky mess has congealed around his pans. He throws his hat down, stomping around and cursing all his wasted effort. In his growing frustration, he heaves the steaming pan outside, tossing the whole mess into the snowbank.

But what's this? Jack goes over to where he tossed the pan. The maple syrup has trickled out onto the snow, where's it's congealed into some foreign, waxy substance. He tastes, and his famous "sugar on snow" is born.

Well, that's probably not what happened. But it still tastes great none-the-less!

Jack wax is made by heating syrup to 35 degrees or so above the boiling point of water. This is more of a guideline however; the syrup should "thread" rather than drip to get that taffy-like consistency on the snow. When done properly, the syrup congeals instantly on contact, and with a fork, you simply roll up the syrup and eat. Probably one of the easiest recipes out there. Best eaten with friends or family; otherwise you're liable to go into sugar shock, having eaten all the jack wax yourself!

Maple Days: Day 6

All day up at the sugar shack! Made 5 gallons.

While boiling, the shack smells like a cloud of sugar; ions of maple infused steam floating around in the air. It makes it kind of hard to see sometimes, but the sugar rush you get from inhaling is totally worth it.

Maple Days: Day 5

No boiling; too cold. But it warmed up by the end of the day, so sugaring will commence again tomorrow! Huzzah!

I am getting accustomed to sugar rushes these days. Mmm.

What is that, you ask? Maple cream! For those of you out there that don't know what that is, it's simple. Take maple syrup, boil away, and you end up with a spreadable form of maple sugar that has a butter-like, creamy texture. Perfect on toast (or just a spoon).

Okay, so it's a little more complicated that that. See the thermometer in the picture above? It's a digital candy thermometer, and the only gadget needed for this process (well, besides a spoon, but I hope you have one of those in your kitchen). To make the cream, you need to boil maple syrup until it's 23 degrees above the boiling point of water. The boiling point of water when we did this was 212.6 (yes, I'm afraid it needs to be that accurate), making the goal temperature 235.6 degrees.

The process takes a couple hours on the stovetop. In the meanwhile, you have to keep an eye on it and stir the syrup when it threatens to boil over. Also, you'll need to get an ice bath ready for the next step.

When you hit 235.6 degrees (or whatever temperature you need) immediately transfer the pot to the ice water bath. You'll need to let it sit - WITHOUT MOVING THE SYRUP AT ALL - until the liquid has cooled to 75 degrees. It'll take about an hour, maybe more.

Rub a dub dub, don't move that tub!

Next up? Stirring. Sounds easy, but this is actually the labor intensive part. Since the sugar has cooled, it's about the consistency of taffy. The best recommendation I have is to stir sitting down. You can hold the pot better with your knees, and you'll probably be at this for a half an hour or so - might as well take it easy.

Keep in mind too, you don't have to stir quickly. Your arms will tire quickly if you attack the sugar, plus it won't really make a difference. The sugar won't set up more quickly by faster stirring.

As you stir for a while, you'll notice some color changes. This is what you have to watch out for. At first, it'll look about the same color as dark maple syrup, but slowly, it will lighten in color.

Eventually, it'll turn a coffee ice-cream color, or a peanut-butter brown. Keep stirring until it looses its sheen; the image below still has some shine because of the lighting, but trust me, after staring at the same pot of sugar you'll be able to tell when this happens.

Now for the final bit! Load up some containers with cream; pretty much anything with a cover will do. You can stick it in the fridge at this point, and after a little while, take another peek. It'll have set up and thickened into maple cream! Enjoy on toast, waffles, pancakes, or in coffee or tea.

And of course, don't forget to lick the bowl.

Maple Days: Day 4

No boiling today! It was too cold again, it only got up to about 35 or 36 degrees. (About 5 inches of sap in the tank.) That trend will likely continue for the next couple days; the forecast isn't looking as warm as it once was.

So rather than making syrup, I used some up today in good, old-fashioned, grandma-style bread. We (being me, a couple uncles, my dad and grandma) made two batches: six loaves. (Notice there's only five in the image. We ate an entire loaf in the process!)

Unfortunately, I refuse to post the recipe here. It's too good!

However, I can disclose how I substitute maple syrup for sugar in recipes.

First, maple syrup can be used in pretty much any recipe that calls for sugar and some amount of liquid. Keep in mind here, that maple has a more distinct taste than normal cane sugar, so even if it's possible to substitute sugar with maple syrup, consider the flavor of the final product. But if that maple flavor is what you're going for, make sure to use grade B -- it tends to have a stronger maple taste to it.

Next, you'll have to do a little bit of math. Maple syrup is 66.6% sugar and 33.3% water. That's 2 parts sugar to 1 part water. You'll need to adjust the quantity of sugar and liquid (usually water) in your recipe accordingly. Substitute 2/3 C sugar and 1/3 C water with 1 C maple syrup. Simple, eh?

However... there are a few snags. Cookies, for example, rarely call for any specific amounts of liquid. Butter, eggs, flour, sugar and spices and you're pretty much good to go. You can't reduce those things without potentially completely screwing up the recipe. But who said baking was a science? You can simply reduce the amount of sugar, and substitute an equal amount of maple syrup. If your recipe needs 1/4 C sugar, just nix it entirely and use 1/4 C syrup. If it calls for something like 1-1/2 C sugar, keep some of the white stuff in, otherwise your cookie dough will turn into a gooey mess. The bread we made today was easy, because it only called for 1/3 C sugar. We just substituted 1/3 C maple syrup, and it worked wonderfully.

Lastly, you'll probably want to find a good hiding spot for your concoction. It's guaranteed to go fast!

Maple Days: Day 3

No boiling today! The sap wasn't really running all that much. Maybe 4 inches in the tank. That doesn't mean there isn't anything to do in the sugarbush though; today was spent checking the lines, and tapping a couple more trees.

There are different kinds of maple trees; all of them can be used for sap: red, soft, hard, sugar. Once the trees are tapped, we use a tubing system to run the sap down to the collecting tank at the bottom of the hill. Above is midway up the sugarbush, looking down on the maze of tubing; no, before you ask, I didn't clothesline myself! Although I did walk into a tree at one point.

It was a nice day for a short snowshoe hike; I had on a sweatshirt and ski jacket, but I was ready to peel off the coat after a while. The snowshoes I have on are actually hand-me-downs from my dad, so nothing fancy. But who's going to be wearing snowshoes to a black tie event anyways?

First up was hunting for the few trees that still needed taps; luckily my dad tagged with marking tape, so it didn't take all day to find them.

Here's the first tree we found. Since it's not so big, maybe a foot or so in diameter, we put in a single tap. Some of the larger trees are able to handle a couple taps, though. I don't think any of our trees are large enough to handle three taps, but I'm sure it's possible.

So the first thing to do is connect your tubing around the tree; this line will run down into one of the main lines, eventually finding its way into the collection tank.

Next, you drill a hole in the tree. The most common question people ask me if drilling holes in the tree hurts it -- don't worry, it doesn't. My dad and uncle have been tapping these trees for decades (other sugarbushes have been tapping for even longer). The trees are healthy and happy.

The hole should be the same width as the tap; a gentle tap with a hammer will secure it so that the snow and wind won't dislodge it. (Occasionally the taps may still pop out for one reason or another, but this is why you wander through to check the lines throughout the season.)

Here's the complete system: hole drilled and tap hooked up, the sap can run down into the lines, where it'll eventually end up on your pancakes.

Another question I get asked is how the sap tastes. Is it sweet? Is it worth drinking on its own? Well, it's about 2% sugar, so it is very slightly sweet. You can tell that it's not just water. But it's really not something you would go out of your way to drink; looking into a sap tank, you visibly wouldn't be able to differentiate it from water. But if you're wandering around a sugar bush, go ahead and try some sap. At the very least, you'll appreciate the super-sweet final product all the more.

When you add taps to a tree, you've got to add them into the system too. Above, my dad is cutting the line and using a plastic connector to link them up. It's kind of like a giant puzzle, assembling all the taps and lines together.

 

A note on materials might be in order at this point: plastic vs. metal. Everyone sees those shiny metal buckets hanging off giant maple trees, sap splooshing into the pale. That's all very nice, if you've got just a few trees. But it gets to be very inefficient very fast, so most producers use a tubing system. The lines are plastic; thus, they need to be replaced every so often. Here we're keeping track of old vs. new tubing using a color scheme. All the green lines are brand new; the pale blue (or translucent) is oldest. To the right, we're replacing a section of old line with new. Some of the dark areas you can make out in the old lines are bacteria, which will build up in the lines more frequently as they age. (Don't worry, it's all cleaned out before it gets anywhere near the syrup stage!)

The taps themselves are also plastic; antique taps may be wooden, or metal, or a combination thereof. Recently, they've come out with stainless steel taps, which in an ideal world, we'd be using. But they're also expensive. Maybe one day!

In addition to putting in three new taps, and replacing a stretch of tubing, we also re-inserted a couple taps that had fallen out, and pulled some lines out of the recently fallen snow. Chipmunks, squirrels, and bunnies can come along and chew on the lines if they're left at ground level, which in turn cause the lines to leak, and that's never good. Each tap can yield up to a quart of syrup in a season, so you consistently need to go up and check on the lines during the season. 

 

Eventually, all this tubing ends up into one of the main lines, which flow directly into the sap tank. It holds 500 gallons, which sounds like more than enough. But it's been near full on multiple occasions when the sap really gets going - which will hopefully happen soon!

Stay tuned! More maple days to come.

Maple Days: Day 2

Taste testing. Lots of taste testing.

Made just over 7 gallons today (29 quarts). My dad insists we would have had 8 gallons if I weren't there. (And he's probably right!)

In a very quick nutshell, this is what goes on to make maple syrup: collect sap, boil sap down in an evaporator, sample, draw off when it gets close to syrup, finish boiling off in separate pans, sample, fill jars, sample, finish filling jars, sample cooled sap from bottom of pans, clean equipment.

There's a lot more to know about making maple syrup, but at the core, it's just boiling away all that water to get down to the good stuff: syrup that's 66.6% sugar and 33.3% water. Adirondack gold.

The arch and evaporator: the first stage of the
boiling process.

Drawing off the sap, nearing the point where
it's syrup.

The finishing pan: the second stage of boiling off.

Getting close! More boiling.

The finished product. Success!

Maple Days: Day 1

I have probably eaten (and drunk) more maple syrup, cream, and candy than the average person consumes in their lifetime. This is probably because unlike the average person, my family operates a small "hobby" scale sugar bush in Warrensburg(h) NY. We make more than enough for family: on average over 50 gallons of syrup in a season. What isn't eaten is easily sold off, and the money goes back into the upkeep of the sugar bush and sugar shack.

The season runs from late February or early March through late March or early April. It all depends on temperature: overnight lows in the 10s/20s and daytime highs in the 40s cause the sap in the trees to freeze and thaw, which in turn cause the sap to "run." Too warm at night, or too cold during the day, and the trees won't offer up that sweet sap.

In this area, these ideal temperatures are being forecast for all of next week -- a busy time in the sugar bush, guaranteed! But there's a lot that happens before the season officially begins: cleaning out the tubing, the evaporator, the pans. Taping the trees. Repairing old tubing. Splitting firewood (LOTS of firewood).

Expect plenty of posts in the coming days, a mini-documentary of maple goodness.

The sugar shack, frosted in snow.

Library

Books galore! I thought I would share a few of my favorite books regarding gardening. They're not necessarily "new" to the publishing world, but still quite helpful and chock full of good information:

Crockett's Victory Garden by James Underwood Crockett.

This used to be a PBS show (where have all the gardening shows on TV gone, anyways?), hosted by the author, but it's way before my time, so I haven't seen it. The book, however, is great for looking up what to do in a particular month, and what individual plants require throughout the year. Helpful tips and suggestions are sprinkled throughout, and there's a handy "when to plant what" chart in the back. Great as a reference book, and the history behind the idea of "victory gardens" is pretty interesting.

I doubt Uncle Sam gardened in those clothes.

Joy of Gardening by Dick Raymond.

Another one based on an old TV show! This one explains various strategies for tackling your garden: how to prepare the soil, start plants, weed, mulch, water, etc. It also has a handy section dedicated just to plants, listed by family. A plethora of images makes this book fun to flip thorough, and it's another great reference book for plants and some common diseases.

The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It: The Complete Back-to-Basics Guide by John Seymour.

This is an absolute treasury of information for any aspiring homesteader. It has everything from milking, carpentry, and gardening to spinning and using wind, water, and solar energy. It was first published in 1976, although it's remained pretty popular, as it's been published a few times since then (my edition is copyright 2002). The sections are generally short, but in a good way: they lay out exactly the information you need, with diagrams and illustrations as visual guides. Somehow this book makes me want to try everything listed on its pages; it makes what is likely a lot of hard work seem easy and enjoyable.


I've got plenty of other books on the topic of gardening and food, but these 3 are what I consider my top reference books. I do use the internet and several online reference sites if I'm curious about a topic or want to look something up, but there's some comfort in turning to a book for help. I don't know if it's the feeling that published words are more reliable, or if it's just the act of curling up with the book for help, but sometimes the internet just doesn't cut it. 

Currently, I'm reading The Dirty Life by Kristen Kimball; there's a lot of farming memoirs out there, but each one has its own charm. I'll probably do a short run-through of some of my favorites someday; this one will certainly be on the list!