Storing boiled down sap

[jamesd14]

Greetings all, this is my first post as this is my first year I will be making maple syrup. I have already found a lot of great info here. One thing I have been trying to find, once I boil my sap down on my homemade evaporator and bring inside to finish, how long can I store that until I actually finish. I ask this because I will not be collecting a lot every day but would like to boil down every day or every other day.Thank you.

[maple flats]

Once boiled it will keep well, but leave it outside to stay cold until a few hours before you are going to finish it. If you boiled it as far as what remains in my evaporator (continuous flow) it will not freeze but you may get some slush on the surface.

[jamesd14]

Thank you very much.

[kiteflyingeek]

Additionally, if you have the space, you can store it in the freezer. I did that last year & it worked out just fine. Kind of depends if outside stays cool enough in your area.


--andrew

[jamesd14]

Great idea, I have an empty chest freezer in the garage I could use for that. I am only going to have about 12 taps this year. I just bought this house and have at least a dozen sugar maples on it and a lot of Norway and Red Maples. I am only going to tap sugar maples this year. How long do you think the boiled down would last in the freezer before finishing. I do plan on finishig at least once a week.

[maple flats]

It will keep, frozen way longer than a week, in fact, I've had up to 2 weeks awaiting more right in my pans with no apparent ill effect. If allowed to warm, everything changes and it would be worse than leaving milk on the table in the sun.

[jamesd14]

Thank you very much

James

[Big_Eddy]

We should be a little more specific. If your sap has been boiled down until it is essentially syrup and is just in need of final density checking and filtering, then it will keep (cool) for a long time.
If you reduced the sap by 50% in volume, but ran out of sap and couldn't boil it down any further, then that partially concentrated sap will not keep long at all, unless it is kept very cold or frozen.

[jamesd14]

That makes a lot of sense, thank you very much. What percentage boiled down would you recommend boiling down to be able to store for a longer period of time Or would you go off a certain temp like maybe just over boiling temp, 213 or so.

[Bucket Head]

I would put that freezer to work regardless of what you boiled down to. Boil until your out of sap or out of time, let it cool, put it in a 5 gal. bucket(s) with a lid (or the bulk 5 gal. containers the maple supply folks sell) and freeze it. That way its good for two days, two weeks or two months. You might not get another run for a while or your pulled away from boiling for whatever reason, but in any event your previous time, energy and "almost syrup" is safe. My father and I did it this way for years. Good luck this season!

Steve

[jamesd14]

That is what I will do, once again, thank you:cool:

[Studhauler]

I would put that freezer to work regardless of what you boiled down to. Boil until your out of sap or out of time, let it cool, put it in a 5 gal. bucket(s) with a lid (or the bulk 5 gal. containers the maple supply folks sell) and freeze it. That way its good for two days, two weeks or two months. You might not get another run for a while or your pulled away from boiling for whatever reason, but in any event your previous time, energy and "almost syrup" is safe. My father and I did it this way for years. Good luck this season!

Steve

That is what I do also. It has worked good for me. I have a very old, very large deep-freeze that I use just for that purpose.

[steve J]

During the week I am a one man show and on weekends I have some help so try to do as much boiling as I can during the week. And I and drawing off some place between syrup and 90%. My cabins basement stays about 36 degrees during this time of year I store it in 12qt and 16qt pots and on weekend merely bring up to temp and density and I have never had an issue. Also when I know that we are going to get extremely cold night or in some cases several nights in a row I have drained my pan and stored for over a week before being able to boil again with no issues.