I Made Tree Syrup

And you can too if you have access to just one tree. Doesn’t even have to be a maple.

I made maple syrup! To be honest, it was more like maple taffy because we accidentally cooked it down too long, but no complaints there. It was still incredibly delicious. The best maple something I’ve ever tasted, because I’d experienced the process of making it myself and it came from the trees out back. I have never felt more Canadian in my life.

Making tree syrup was a life goal I never thought I would achieve until we moved here and I started identifying the trees. I say tree syrup and not just maple syrup because while all maple trees can be tapped (yes, even Manitoba maple aka box elder), lots of other trees can be tapped for their sugary sap too. Black walnut, hickories, and birches also make edible, sweet saps with varying flavours. Some people say that oaks are technically tappable too, but the resulting sap is bitter and full of tannins that become even more concentrated in the process. It wouldn’t taste good even if won’t kill you, so I consider them a no and wouldn’t encourage anyone else to try. Sugar maple remains the holy grail because it has the highest sugar content. Unfortunately, there aren’t any around me as they tend to favour higher and drier ground and our area is low lying and WET.

The first tree we tried is a giant red maple in our neighbour’s yard. Of course, we asked permission first! I chose this one because it’s the largest tree closest to the house and I didn’t have the energy to keep walking back and forth a long distance to check up on the sap as I was getting my footing with the process. There are red and silver maples along the eastern edge of our property line, but they’re too small. The minimum size you should tap into is 10” diameter. Hopefully, we’ll live here long enough to tap them one day. Most of the remaining maples are in the woods out back. Once we had success with the first, we cut a path to a second maple and started tapping that. Today we tapped a third tree, a large black walnut. There are some hickories further in that I’m considering next. I’m excited to find out how the tastes of the various tree saps compare.

I tasted the watery sap as it came out of the red maple tree. It was very mildly sweet and refreshing. Like really good, fresh water. Still, I’m curious about what it is like compared to sugar maple, which is supposed to be quite a bit sweeter.