Maple Syrup | Itty Bitty Impact

Making Maple Syrup IV: Canning

Posted on09. Apr, 2010 by Tonia.

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Maple Moon Sugarbush is starting to wrap up its 2010 sugaring season this week. My family and I will be pulling the taps out of the trees and washing up all the equipment soon. We made about 25 gallons this year, which means we have plenty for our Sunday pancakes and to replenish our friends and [...]

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Making Maple Syrup III: Boiling

Posted on07. Apr, 2010 by Tonia.

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Boiling is my favorite part of the syrup making process. It is also the most tedious of all the steps. My dad is the boiling master, but Mike has been slowly aquiring the skills from him over the past couple seasons {we plan to carry on the tradition someday with our own kids.}

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Making Maple Syrup II: Collecting

Posted on06. Apr, 2010 by Tonia.

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When all the trees are tapped, we wait for the buckets to fill with sap. Some years, when the weather is right, we’ll need to collect twice a day, because the sap is flowing so fast. The ideal weather for a good sap run only happens during a small window of time every spring {usually lasting a week}. It needs to freeze at night, and then warm up to about 50 degrees during the day. This is a tricky weather combination, but the best syrup is made during this window- a beautiful amber color and buttery taste.

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Making Maple Syrup: Tapping

Posted on04. Apr, 2010 by Tonia.

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Sweet, buttery, sticky, wonderful maple syrup has been made in my family for 23 years now. Back in the day, we used to tap 1,100 trees on our land, pouring what we collected into a big tank on a sleigh, pulled by a draft horse. It was a lot of work, but we were never short on help {all we had to tell people was that they could take home some syrup, and they’d show up to help all season long.} Even though we have scaled the operation back in recent years {we no longer have our horses, so we do all the collection on foot now}, syruping is still a beloved family “chore” that brings us together every spring.