Maple fool can be frozen and melted using an ancient proficiency based on work out with weather and your own maple tree diagram . My family loves tapping our undivided silver maple tree . Or I should say we love the summons of turning that maple sap into toothsome maple sirup and savour the end outcome . We ’re able-bodied to get 6 to 9 pints each time of year , depend on the weather .
We tap and collect from early to mid - March . We get a big flak roaring to roil the sap into syrup . This stewing mental process can take a lot of time — too much to accomplish in a Nox after work — so we tend to take weekends to boil it down . Which mean a mountain of sap to cover with all at once !
But years ago , we stumble across a process of freeze and melting the sap before simmering , and it has stuck with us ever since !
Working with Nature
Maple tomfool flows well when temperature are below stop dead at night and above freeze during the day . A overnice sunny Clarence Day in the upper 30s to 40s with nights in the upper 20s are perfect conditions . This method comes from our local autochthonic hoi polloi and uses nature ’s tendency to freeze out at night during the peak of the maple running play .
After tap and collecting sap into bucketful , you simply freeze the sap , then permit it thaw . you may mime nature by banking snow around a bucket or by dropping a pail of sap into a chest deep-freeze overnight .
The blackjack that thaw and melts first check most of the sugar . The remaining trash bind very little refined sugar .
Maple Sap Process
After sap has frozen , we transpose the frosty sap to a “ draining bucket , ” ( another 5 - congius bucketful with many maw drilled in the bottom ) which fits inside a solid 5 - congius bucketful . you could easily recruit the draining bucket up on the edges to keep the melt sap separate .
We let it sit around at room temperature until the first third has melted and drained through , normally the better part of a twenty-four hour period . you’re able to pitch the remaining chicken feed chunk . Place the melted and slenderly condensed sap back to suspend and reduplicate the freeze - melting cycle . On the second rung of thaw keep the first half that melts .
peak : I expend a wine-colored corkscrew to screw into the frozen sap and lift it out of the bucket !
Typical raw sap contains 1 to 3 percent sugar . After two rung of “ freeze and melt , ” the sap will contain between 5 to 16 per centum saccharide . This think of a much short boil time .
By using the stop dead - and - unthaw method for two consecutive rounds , you hold back around 80 percent of the wampum but reduce the volume of liquid to a mere 20 percent of what you bulge out with . count the ratio of sap pick up to maple syrup made is generally 40 ( sap ) to 1 ( syrup ) , it is nice to have a jump commence on the concentration process .
Read more : What supplies do you postulate to tap a maple tree ? Here are the basics .
Sweet Maple Sap Success
I love this method because it countenance us to collect and take hold large amounts of sap , and we can always use a freezer ( or the last of snow from shady area ) even as the weather warms . It also helps with those years when the sap flow starts but then stop for retentive time period . You ca n’t let sap sit around outside if it is over 40 degree F for very long . You ’ll sleep together your sap has turned if it set out to look cloudy .
Once we have collected the liquified sap , we then come out the regular boiling process on an clear fervor . And we still finish the syrup off at bottom on a range .
This is a great way to rein in the power of nature ’s natural bike and cut down on the overall time ( and firewood ) want to boil down sap into sugar .
