What on earth is that?
Pure maple syrup, that's what!
Our son's farm in Salisbury, PA is in the heart of maple syrup country.
We are surrounded by farms who tap the trees with blue lines that run from tree to tree, but so far, Kevin and Katie are still doing it the old-fashioned way with sap buckets. This is just a couple of the many trees he tapped.
The first week of March, Kevin was collecting the sap from the buckets every day and then pouring them into a large pan over a fire.
Then we fed the fire every few minutes to keep the syrup boiling.
It's a looonnnng process!
The boiling syrup creates a constant steam. Country roads are dotted with sugar camps, and the rising smoke from the fire and steam from the syrup are dead giveaways to their locations.
You have to keep a constant eye on how much sap is in the pan. It will burn easily if it gets too low. But it can be difficult to see the sap through the steam!
Momentarily, the air will shift, and you can once again see it boiling underneath the steam.
The sap starts out looking like water, but by the time it's close to finished, it takes on the beautiful amber hues we know as syrup, and the sweet smell fills the air.
After several days of collecting sap from the trees and boiling it down, they ended up with 7 gallons of pure maple syrup for their own use. They aren't selling it commercially at this point. That would involve big (expensive!) changes to their operation. For now, they just enjoy making it the same way generations of folks did before them.
And now, pass the pancakes!
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