Maple syrup boiling season has come to an end. For being my first year I consider it a huge success. I can say that moving forward, I would like to invest in a better boiling set up and possibly a small structure to put it in. I feel like a lot of heat was lost in my open air boiling set up. I chose this set up because I wanted to invest as little money as possible in case I hated the collecting and the boiling of the maple sap. I purchased a hotel buffet steam tray for $25, 6 cinder blocks for $12, 1 grill grate for $14 TOTAL $51.
It took me about 6 hours to boil down maple sap into syrup. The majority of the boil was done outside. Once the sap evaporated down to half way I would add more and repeat until all the sap was put in the pot.
After that when it was evaporated to only a quarter pan of liquid I
would get my stock pot ready and filter/strainer and strain it off so it
could be moved inside. Its a good idea to strain it now while its hot. There ends up being all sorts of debris such as bugs, leaves, ash or weird bits of grass.
When I got it in the house to the stove I set the stove on high to get a rapid boil. I kept a close eye on it and checked the temp every so often.
Once it reduced in half again,I knew I was getting close when it started to foam and boil up. I had to adjust the heat and stay right near it,checking the temp more often.
The temp finally reached 7 degrees beyond the point of water boiling. I removed it from the heat and filtered it again through a thicker filter. This process was slow and annoying. Some people use a hydrometer to measure to figure out when the syrup is done. Mine was still packed away in the beer brewing supplies and I was too lazy to dig it up.
Now it was time to get the clean sterilized jars ready. I poured the syrup into the jars and placed the lids on. At this point the whole house smelled delicious.
I was talking to an old guy at the coffee shop he was telling me about his sap operation and how he moved up to this area in the late 1960s with just a motorcycle and a tent and was living off grid for many years with his family. A few days later I went back to the coffee shop to find he left me a note to call him asap. He gave me 40 gallons of sap!!! He said he boiled down enough for the year and wanted me to have it. My son and I drove over there and picked it up. He gave us a tour of his homestead and his boiling operation. He likes to build stuff from found objects or junk. He really inspired me to think outside of the box on what I can create without buying everything brand new. Also it was a great lesson on social capital. Meaning its very valuable making connections with people and building a network. Not only did I score 40 gallons of sap but this man offered to mentor me and answer any questions I have.
That is a really interesting post. Talk about getting stuff done and learning new skills. I am really interested in this once we get our land.
ReplyDeleteSo, you think having a "boiling shack" is better than open flame like this? Interesting....Did the gentleman have a specific boiling room?
yes! the guy had a drum boiler inside a small shack. If you look at the above pic he had the fire inside the drum with a hotel pan cut into the drum for the syrup. then he had two stock pots on top of the drum to keep the sap warm. The two stock pots were fitted with a valve at the bottom to release sap into the hotel pan. He says its best to add warm sap to the syrup boiling down to avoid drastic temperature drops. When the syrup is done with the first boil he transfers his to a turkey fryer propane set up for the last boil part. he uses a thermometer and a hydrometer. Some people have huge "sugaring shacks" with $8,000 evaporators. That is totally out of my budget.
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