One of my all-time favourite seasons is upon us, the maple sap is running and it's time to make maple syrup. I know from my contacts in the community that activity has started in the maple sugar bushes around Grey County and the next few weeks will be busy in the sugar shacks.
It's the end product that counts of course, and we love our maple syrup.
But if you visit a maple syrup operation during the boiling time, it's the atmosphere in the sugar shack that's special, with its humidity and its sweet smell. On the Kemble Maple Syrup Tour at the end of the season we've visited all size operations, from enormous gleaming stainless steel evaporator to a pan over an outdoor wood stove. This is a fairly large one.
A sunny day in a maple sugar bush is just as special. Nowadays modern operations use collecting tubes and reverse-osmosis pumps which save enormously on labour. But they do make walking through the woods difficult!
But smaller family operations still hang the buckets on trees. We made our own syrup for several years, decades ago now, using an old stove in the garage. You learn quickly how few seconds there are between ideal syrup and a burnt pot!
These photos are from the first time we went on the
Kemble Maple Syrup Tour, in 2015. I hope we'll get there again; there's at least one farm that's wheelchair accessible. And the church that sponsors it serves an amazing pancake lunch with plenty of maple syrup!
That is a sure sign of spring!
ReplyDeleteIt's begun here, too.
ReplyDeleteQuite an interesting thing to see!! Spring is just around the corner!
ReplyDeleteYears ago it was common to see sap buckets hanging on roadside trees and many yard trees, more recently they seem to have disappeared and it seems hardly anyone is making homebrewed maple syrup. That's unfortunate since it's a fun thing to do, especially with kids, and a valuable lesson that groceries don't just come from the grocery store.
ReplyDeleteA great way to end the winter.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing like Pure Maple Syrup.
ReplyDeleteSaw the process at the Pioneer Homestead Park with the grandson's.
Be safe and Enjoy the fruits of someone's labour.
It.s about time.
Just reading about maple syrup and I can almost taste it. It's a very special treat that I allow myself once in awhile. :-)
ReplyDeleteOh, how I wish I was there at syrup season.Love those large jars, I can visualise that aroma as you uncork the bottle or unscrew the top off the lovely glass container.
ReplyDeleteI can smell it now! We love our REAL maple syrup and will buy nothing less now. For years, we had only the cheap imitation because Mom was feeding a large family of 8.
ReplyDeletethis would be my favorite season as well!!! i too hope you get to go back!!
ReplyDeleteThe maple syrup harvest seems early to me this year. Maybe I'm used to hearing more about Maple Syrup around the end of the month when Elmira has their big maple syrup festival.
ReplyDeleteThis is maple time in New England as well, no surprise I know. But since we are transplants here it amazes us to "see" the process which we have done a couple of times in the past. While we have enjoyed local syrup, we also have purchased maple syrup produced in Canada and found it delicious as well. There's certainly nothing better on a hot stack of pancakes !
ReplyDeleteI saw this on an Iowa pbs where they tied all the trees with a common hose of large tube to darin down the hills. I bet that syrup is delicious.
ReplyDelete