syrup final product help

[mikecon3]

I boiled down my sap for the first time. I got it to 219, which should be the ideal temp for my area. I filtered it numerous times, and bottled it. In the bottle it's a nice golden brown color, but looks cloudy after it cooled. If I shake it, the clouds seem to go away. Is this normal?

[Cedar Eater]

In my brief experience, I've found that the cloudiness will eventually settle to a very fine dust on the bottom. It won't hurt to eat it, but if you're selling commercially, some buyers might not like it. My guess it that the filter was not fine enough.

[Sugarmaker]

I boiled down my sap for the first time. I got it to 219, which should be the ideal temp for my area. I filtered it numerous times, and bottled it. In the bottle it's a nice golden brown color, but looks cloudy after it cooled. If I shake it, the clouds seem to go away. Is this normal?

Tell us about your filtering numerous times? You should only have to filter it once, Bring syrup to boil, filter through cone filter and couple of paper filters inside it. After filtering, reheat gently to 180 F and then bottle while syrup temp is maintained.
I have seen clouds (mother) form in the bottom of glass after it has set for months.
Regards,
Chris

[mikecon3]

I used cone filters when transferring from the bucket to the pan, and the pan to the final pan.

[saphound]

What about between the final pan and the bottle or jar or whatever it is you are putting it in? Typically, that is when you filter.

[Sugarmaker]

This sounds like your filtering during the boiling process? While not a bad thing to do this is not going to get the sugar sand which is not ready to come out until the final product is hot syrup. Once you have hot finished syrup (correct density) you need to filter it to remove the sugar sand.
Regards,
Chris

[Swagner]

If you don't have the money currently to invest in a good filter set-up a trick that I use that works great is to jar the syrup and let everything just settle to the bottom for roughly a week. At this point pour off your good syrup into a clean jar and you will have the clearest syrup ever

[Helicopter Seeds]

I have been having inconsistent filtering results, reading this site has helped. Seems that if I wait until the syrup is done, it does not flow through the filters very well. So I have been filtering at 217 degrees, but I understand the niter can be forming hotter. My biggest batch - 2 gallons, all in brand new bottles, all got cloudy as they cooled. next day, it settled halfway, and after a week it was an inch off the bottom. I was thinking of using Swagner's method, but concerned that when I reheat I will form more niter. My plan now is to wait another week or two (no hurry, they're safely bottled) and decant my entire crop - 4 1/4 gallons, leaving an inch in the bottle, back into the pot, bring to 180, and rebottle. Then, take the last inch, rinse each with another inch of hot water, and put it in another pot, filter it out, re-boil it down. I hate wasting that much. If nothing else, maybe I make sugar from it.
And - I have to order more caps! Who wants a bottle that looks 'opened'.

[Helicopter Seeds]

Update - Using several stainless steel pots, I un-bottled the whole crop, canted and reheated in one, the rest from each I added a touch hot water, re-boiled and filtered. back and forth, ultimately I was able to get the whole batch nice and clear. This year, I will boil down and store until I have a pail full, so the filtering will be less frequent. except maybe a small batch for sampling.

[buckeye gold]

I think most of us small hobby guys struggle with filtering. Small batches cool really fast and that complicates filtering. I have used two approaches, do smaller batches more often or hold to do larger batches. I like doing small batches of a quart or two best. However, there are times when you can filter until your blue and still get cloudy syrup with gravity through fiber filters. This happens more the deeper you get in season. when I get to the point I see syrup slowing up going through the filter I stir in some filter aide just before filtering and this helps a lot. when it gets bad I filter twice, once at 217 -218 then finish on propane and stir in filter aide and filter through two prefilters and a final filter. I have good results with this.

Here are some technique tips you may or may not already do:

Keep filters warm by hanging them in the steam column off the evaporator
wet the filters with hot water or sap
Pull prefilters before they stop running by gently lifting and dumping syrup into the next layer. I pull my 1st prefilter within 30 seconds
cover your filter pot with a lid
try some filter aide
always final filter just prior to bottling and don't bottle over 190 degrees
Rinse your filters in your evaporator to recover some syrup.

Also my wife sews my filters with side to fit into my filter frame like a glove so there is no bunching. I find this gives the syrup more surface area and you can tip it up to utilize the sides. Even after all this there will be days that you end up with slightly cloudy syrup, but it won't be enough to matter. at the end of season I get really frustrated and always have some I have to just let settle. This we just keep for personal use. You aren't experiencing anything that all of us using small gravity filter set ups don't deal with. So your not doing anything seriously wrong, your just learning

[Jebediah]

We don't filter (we also don't sell it). People we give it to eat it right up.