It is hard to believe no frost with 2-3 feet of ice still on the lakes. I can almost see my driveway again though!
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It is hard to believe no frost with 2-3 feet of ice still on the lakes. I can almost see my driveway again though!
I thought yesterday would have been better also, was a wee bit disappointed when I went and checked everything around 5 pm, collected about 6 gallons and boiled it last night, ended up with just under a ltr of finished syrup,all my taps were dripping pretty good,hopefully they dripped all night.
Weatherman said it was suppose to go down to -4 last night....and it only went down +1. So things didn't freeze which does not bode well for today. Keeping fingers crossed it may have ran through the night as well.
I agree. Like I said I was shocked when he told me. He is in the construction business and said there is little to no frost anywhere around here. He figures because of heavy snow cover basically since first of December kept ground insulated. I would guess other areas with less snow cover would have more frost.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yellzee
I have a question,I did a search for it and came up with lots of post's and replies,but it will take me years to go through them all and find what i am looking for lol.
Filtering has been a pain for me since starting this maple syrup hobby,have tried lots of different ways of filtering,coffee filters sometimes work for me,then the next batch I do it doesn't flow through them,but the batch before would run right through them and come out crystal clear,so I bought a Orlon filter cone to try out,last night was my first time using it,I put 3 pre-filters in the cone,when my syrup was done on the stove I wet the cone filter with super hot water and squeezed out the excess water,poured my boiling sap into the filter and it started to run through and eventually slowed to a drip,so I took out 1 pre-filter and let it drip some more and ended up over a few minutes removing the other 2 pre-filters and got all the syrup to eventually go through the cone filter. But it seems like there is allot of syrup still in the filter itself and I just didn't have it in me to run it under hot water to clean it right away, seems like a waste,I left it hanging over my syrup over night to see if it would slowly drip out so I am not wasting what is still in the filter fibers, so this morning I stuck the filter in a bag in the freezer till I could find an answer.
Am I doing something wrong ? After I filter it with the cone filter,do I just count my losses and rinse it? Do I maybe dip it in boiling sap to get the finished syrup out?
Any suggestions or help would be fantastic, I know this topic has been covered before and hopefully I don't anger anyone with my questions, I did do a search, but like I said, there is so many post's that come up it would take years to go through them all.
Hey Bruteman, you definitely lose a lot to the orlon. I used it all last year the same way as you, but though many would say not to, I would gently massage a bit of it out at the end, and never had any niter come through. I bottle in glass, so clarity is important and my syrup looks really clear. This year though, I'm thinking of using diaper flannel cut into squares that I can pin over a pot. The cones are a pain to filter small batches with for my setup, so maybe that would be easier. I have a friend doing it that way and gets very clear syrup. He'll start with about 5 layers and remove as they plug up.
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I also tried a filter, the big flannel kind, and it just sucks up the syrup!!! So I've abandoned that, Especially as I make teeny batches every drop counts. I've gone to using cut-up squares of white cotton (trying to remember where I got it from...a clean, new white T-shirt washed only in hot water with no detergent, or similar) and they work for me. See no reason why Kyle's diaper trick wouldn't work too :-)
You can also ask Karen, aka Run Forest Run! She's a dab hand at this kind of stuff, been making all kinds of preserves for a good long time, and winning at fairs and the like with them. She may have been the one who told me about the clean white cotton for filters.
Anyhoo good luck...and as I'm marooned for the weekend, may as well trudge around and check my trees...think there's maybe a litre out there...*sigh*
I used to be a chef and not 5 mins ago I cut up a brand new white chef jacket I had bought just before getting out of the cooking industry, goingto give that a try tonight after i finish boiling, I will try a few layers and remove them as needed.
Oh cool, another former foodie! Once upon a time, a million years ago, in a land far, far away, I had a gourmet mustard business, I could talk food all day. Still have the apron I wore at shows and promos. Wouldn't use it though. But yeah, no reason that a brand-new chef's jacket wouldn't work well, let me know and maybe I'll get to Ottawa and Chef's Paradise for some whites ;-0
mmmmmmmm , me loves mustard ;)