Having a big log pile reminds me of being 16 back when I had my dad’s car and had just filled up the gas tank. So many options; so much potential. I have that feeling now as I look across the street from my house at this big, honking pile of hardwood. We took about [...]
It’s been a couple days since we last boiled, as the sap flow has slowed with the warming weather, and along with it our maple syrup production.
The boil we did do, though, was a doozy, with steam coming out in clouds, the wind taking it in all directions, once sending it down Tucker Hill Road [...]
We’ve made some pretty thick batches of maple syrup. This is probably the largest sugar crystal-to-maple-syrup-volume ratio I’ve seen in one of our bottles. This is a 500 ml bottle, with a rock sugar crystal at the bottom that might be more than 5 percent of the original volume of the maple syrup. It was [...]
Another reader question:
I am looking for some help in my own attempt at maple sugaring. This is the first time we have ever attempted this, and the syrup we produced has a very off flavor. Almost like rotten fruit? Any tips? -Tara
There are a few things that can cause these off flavors in maple syrup. [...]
We packed some of our Grade A Dark Amber maple syrup into our square bottles a few nights ago. We pack it strong. They were left overnight on the cold concrete floor, as temperatures dipped pretty low. The maple syrup at that temperature can keep only so much sugar in solution, so some of it [...]
We made our first maple syrup of the year today, a beautiful and very light Dark Amber. After we filter it, it might actually be a medium amber. Because we’re being extra careful with the new evaporator, we didn’t pre-concentrate the sap very high (from two percent sugar to four percent sugar), so it took [...]
This has to be categorized as taking one for the team. I was eager (at first) to test out three different fake maple syrup flavorings I ordered over the internet. But then I smelled them, and boy, it was a learning experience.
[The culprits]
Fake maple syrup is typically made with sugar, some sort of chemical thickener, [...]
It’s certainly not news to find strange smells in New York City, but this one caught my attention. Over the past couple of years, people have been noticing a “maple syrup smell” wafting through Manhattan and boroughs east of it. It’s become a bit of a running joke among the hipster blog sites infesting the [...]
We tend to make our maple syrup overstrength, ranging from 70 percent solids to 72 percent solids, about two to four percent higher than Vermont recommends. We just like it that way, even though some sugar comes out of solution in the form of crystals over time. When consumed before that happens, though, the extra [...]
I got an email from a recent customer today asking whether or not our syrup is “100 percent maple” and “pure.” He noticed that neither term was mentioned on the label, while it’s plastered on many others.
I replied that it is, and that by indicating “Vermont maple syrup” on the label, it’s required to be [...]