Monday, February 15, 2010

Time to Tap the Trees


Valentine's Day is traditionally the day we tap the Maple trees. Gary, Cassidy and Kierra went out yesterday armed with sap buckets, taps and covers, and a drill, of course, and tapped the trees. For the next few weeks, until St. Patrick's Day, we will trudge through the snow into the woods and check the buckets. At first, the sap usually runs slow, but in a few weeks we will be carrying heavy, sap-filled buckets back to the house daily. We'll empty the buckets into a turkey fryer and when full, my husband will burn the sap down over the turkey gas burner. I'll post a few more pictures and directions during the first burn. If you haven't tried making Maple syrup before and you have maple trees in your backyard, I encourage you to give it a go. It's a lot of fun, a great project for the kids and everyone will be happy with the end result... home-made, yummy Maple syrup!

2 comments:

Cheryl said...

sounds like fun Sue. I saw on another blog... www.homespunliving.blogspot.com
where they do maple sugaring as well. Looking forward to your posts. I bet the syrup tastes delicious.
Do you do anything with it other than using for breakfast?

Cheryl said...

So, how is the maple sugaring going? Mouth watering over here. I love maple syrup. I actually broke down and bought some a month ago for the first time. A little pricey, but worth it. I found when i made pancakes that i didn't use as much syrup because it's so decadent. well, to me anyway.
To answer your question, yes, we are move moving. you are so right the house looks great when one moves and all the little projects get done. we are right smack dab in the middle of that right now.