Maple Syrup

Finished Maple Syrup.

Making maple syrup is a lot of work.  I mean A LOT.  Much of the work is due to the fact that one must boil and condense much of the maple sap so that the sugars get concentrated, thus resulting in maple syrup.  So, this past Sunday, I boiled down five gallons  of sap to get a pint of syrup.

Strainer with coffee filter, used to strain the sap before the sap is boiled.

I opted to boil down the sap outside and Sunday was a beautiful day to make maple syrup (even though it rained the day before and much of the wood outside was wet).  I had to strain the sap before boiling it in order to remove some of the small wood chips and bit of dirt.  Then I boiled the sap in one pan, using a propane burner.  At the same time, I also preboiled some sap, using wood.  The preboiled sap is then strained again (to get out the wood ashes) and added to the pan that was on the propane burner.  I continued boiling it outside until it was greatly reduced, and then brought it inside to finish off.

 

Boiling the sap outside on a makeshift "grill."

When finishing off the syrup, I boiled the syrup until it got to 219 degrees F.  I turned off the heat, strained the hot syrup through paper towels and canned it.  To can my syrup, I fill the sterilized little half pint jar, leaving a 1/4 head.  I put the jar with syrup in the mircowave for about 35 seconds, heating the syrup up to 180 degrees F.  I then take it out, put on a clean unused sterilized top and screw into place the top.  I turn the jar on its side and upside down and then wait for the jar to seal itself.

Finishing off the sap inside the house.

As I said, homemade maple syrup is A LOT of work, but it's so well worth the effort.  It's so yummy.  I'm now using my maple syrup as a substitute in my coffee in the morning.  Despite the hard work, I think I'd love to do this again next year.