Maple syrup
- Thread starter Peeps
- Start date
Bill Loser
5 year old buck +
2 weeks my taps have been in, finally got some decent amounts today. Hauled out about 35 -40 gallons and left another 15-20 in the woods. Have full buckets and stuff, it'll stay cooler in the woods. Set up the evaporator on Sunday and did a test burn to see how the draft is in the new stove, not sure i like it but want to see how it does with the pan in place before adjusting.
Anybody have tips on filtering sap? I've been doing syrup for 4 years now 25-30 gallons of sap a year. I've been just filtering thru a coffee filter. They get plugged up fast and run really slow. There has to be better way.
Bill Loser
5 year old buck +
My process is hillbilly engineering at its best.
First i filter out of the pan through a orlon filter lined with a flour sack towel.
Then i finish it on a turkey fryer, when finished i use one of those huge coffee percolators. I run water through to heat it up, then set up my cone and flower sack Towel and final filter through that. I hang the filters inside the coffee pot to keep it all hot. Fill right off the built in valve and close the jars up. Its simple and i got 2 of those percolators free, I think they're 100 cup or something like that.
Simple, easy and i havent had a spot of sediment since i started doing it that way.
Boiled my first batch today, i love, love love this divided pan.
First i filter out of the pan through a orlon filter lined with a flour sack towel.
Then i finish it on a turkey fryer, when finished i use one of those huge coffee percolators. I run water through to heat it up, then set up my cone and flower sack Towel and final filter through that. I hang the filters inside the coffee pot to keep it all hot. Fill right off the built in valve and close the jars up. Its simple and i got 2 of those percolators free, I think they're 100 cup or something like that.
Simple, easy and i havent had a spot of sediment since i started doing it that way.
Boiled my first batch today, i love, love love this divided pan.
Buckly
5 year old buck +
Syrup filters, pre filters and heavy filters are not really that expensive and can do about a quart at a time. Filter while hot but not yet to syrup and that gets most all the sand out. Then finish and do a final filter. You can jerry rig however you want to hold the filter over a pan.
Bill Loser
5 year old buck +
I do agree with all of that,the paper filters work ok. BUT, flour sack towels are about $1.99 for a 12 pack and you just wash them out and reuse year after year. Honestly i think the towels filter better than the paper filters. Has anyone ever used a filter press?
Bill Loser
5 year old buck +
What is a cooking oil filter? What size are they?
I saw them next to the turkey fryers so I gave them a shot and they work a little better than coffee filters because they are bigger.
chucker66
5 year old buck +
Just bite the bullet and get a filter like Buckly is showing above. The first few years I did this I used cheese cloth and coffee filters. What a PITA. The felt filters will last a while if you clean them thoroughly after each use and the syrup is way better once filtered. I filter at about 218 degrees just before I have syrup and then do a final cook. The sap is a little thinner yet and filters great. You won't be disappointed.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
I don't make syrup, but my wife and I took our sons when they were young to a sugar shack in northern Pa. They were in awe of the smell of the steam, the fire below the evaporator pans, and the father / son team made sure to give each of our sons a taste of the syrup when it was still just warm. They explained the whole process to our sons. As it turns out, when the men asked us my name, the father maple-sugarer used to work with one of my great uncles timbering - waaaay back using horses to drag out the logs. We became fast friends and they even invited us to have dinner with them!!!! We've since bought gallons of maple syrup from their family.
SMALL world .......... and it started with seeing steam from their woods while on a Sunday drive.
Enjoy every minute of your sugaring adventures, gentlemen. It's a time-treasured process that, hopefully, will continue for generations to come. Great exposure for young folks.
SMALL world .......... and it started with seeing steam from their woods while on a Sunday drive.
Enjoy every minute of your sugaring adventures, gentlemen. It's a time-treasured process that, hopefully, will continue for generations to come. Great exposure for young folks.
Peeps
5 year old buck +
My wife went up to our place this morning to collect sap for the first time this season. She just called me and said there has been no flow all the buckets are empty. I thought for sure there would have been flow as yesterday and day before were first days above 40. Only thing I can think of is before that it was still getting down in the single digits and we still have about 2 ft of snow on the ground. Maybe it’ll open up any day now?
chucker66
5 year old buck +
Same thing we have up here near Rice Lake. Not running yet but should start in the next few days.
westonwhitetail
5 year old buck +
I’m in central WI and yesterday a couple trees out of 20 woke up and gave about a gallon. The rest didn’t do anything. They should all start soon with the weather coming up
I just clean a plain white T-shirt and cut it in half and use that to filter syrup. I put the T-shirt material on a spaghetti type strainer and then put that over a large pot for the finished syrup to collect in after filtering. It works great for me. I usually get 3-5 gallons of finished syrup every year just tapping a few trees in my yard.
Natty Bumppo
5 year old buck +
I am just a small scale hobbyist
I've done the same. I do have one of the stainless steel filter boxes like Buckly showed, but I can never get the synthetic filter to work. Seems like it gets clogged very easily no matter how many pre-filters I use or how hot the syrup goes in.
I've used white t-shirts. And now I just use the pre-filters alone. They seem to work decently. Also, we just do it for a hobby and use the syrup ourselves and give it away to family and friends. Not selling it. So I do what I can with the pre-filters and then just let the rest settle out once bottled. Comes out fine.
I've done the same. I do have one of the stainless steel filter boxes like Buckly showed, but I can never get the synthetic filter to work. Seems like it gets clogged very easily no matter how many pre-filters I use or how hot the syrup goes in.
I've used white t-shirts. And now I just use the pre-filters alone. They seem to work decently. Also, we just do it for a hobby and use the syrup ourselves and give it away to family and friends. Not selling it. So I do what I can with the pre-filters and then just let the rest settle out once bottled. Comes out fine.
Bill Loser
5 year old buck +
When I first started this I was a total freak about filtering. I filtered from the tree to the receptacle , from that to the pan, from the pan to the finishing pot, then halfway through the finish filter again, then a final filter at bottling time. In the end it was a total mess, and I still got sediment. So I cut most of it out, Now I filter out of the pan, and then at bottling and that's it. Now I get 0 sediment.
Question for the guys with divided pans. When finished cooking how do you empty the pan? Do you let it cool completely and drain it or push sap out with water?
Question for the guys with divided pans. When finished cooking how do you empty the pan? Do you let it cool completely and drain it or push sap out with water?
b116757
5 year old buck +
Filtering syrup is totally different than sap for sap we use a simple window screen filter as it feeds into the evaporator 3’x12’. Syrup is filtered as it’s drawn off the big evaporator thru the big felt filter with liner. That is then done a second time when we take the finished syrup off the 2’x4’ propane fired finishing pan. It then goes into a filter press and then a water jacket bottling unit that holds it at bottling temperature. There is generally days between drawing the syrup off the big evaporator and a finishing/bottling day to let the syrup rest and settle out we generally pour off the clear and save the sugar sand contaminated syrup to fool with latter at the end of season or use as bear bait. Filtering is generally everyone’s biggest challenge. Seems like some years are simply worse than others for sugar sand we have always thought it to be weather related??? And not necessarily weather during the syrup season but throughout the previous year.
