Of course it's not homemade, but rather something from the field of jam-making, but it seemed to me many would be interested. If birch is a symbol of Russia, then maple is a symbol of Canada. And just as birch sap is harvested in Russia, maple sap is harvested in Canada. Only, unlike birch, maple still needs to be cooked after harvesting.
Sugar maple (Acer saccharum) is best suited for collecting juice, but if it is absent, it can be harvested from any tree in the maple family.
The principle of collecting maple juice is similar to the collection of birch. A small hole is drilled in a tree trunk. A special groove is inserted into the hole, through which the juice escapes into the container. Of course, you can make an incision or break a twig, but drilling is the safest way for a tree. At the end of the juice collection, the grooves are removed and wooden plugs are installed in their place. From above they are covered with garden var. Over time, the plug will swell and plug the hole tightly. This method is also preferred for collecting birch sap.
According to the master’s experience, maple juice is best harvested in spring when the temperature varies from -4 at night to +4 in the afternoon.
Every day, the juice needs to be collected and poured into a larger capacity food container. Store juice no more than 7 days at low temperature.
Now you can start to boil the juice. When boiling from 40 liters of collected juice, 1 liter of syrup is obtained. The room should be well ventilated, as there is a very high concentration of steam.
The containers are filled with juice and put on fire. The temperature of the juice, with proper preparation, should be 4 degrees above the boiling point of water, for a given area. As you boil, you need to add a new portion of juice to the container. After a while, the entire batch of juice was processed and the author made 5 liters of syrup from 200 liters of juice. In time, it took more than 12 hours.
The syrup is cooked and it needs to be filtered quickly before it cools down. Filtering maple syrup is an important process that improves clarity, taste and color. The author filters the syrup through a gauze filter. You need to filter at least 2 times, and more can be. And be sure the syrup must be hot.
The syrup is ready, it remains to pour it into jars.
These are Canadian maple syrup technologies. Of course, the season has already passed, but if you make maple juice next year, do not forget to send me a sample too)))