Plastic-flavored sap

[RunInCircles]

Hey folks, after months of lurking, here's my first post.

It's been a rough couple weeks of weather without any strong sap flows here in SW New Hampshire. It's my first experience with tubing, and the sap running today tastes pretty strongly of the plastic tubing. I know there are no stupid questions, so here it is: Was I supposed to somehow rinse out my semi-rigid before stringing it all up?

I assume boiling that sap would produce some pretty funky syrup if it would just concentrate the plastic flavor. I only have about 30 gallons so far. I'd rather ditch it and boil newer stuff if it means the lines have been rinsed with the first sap runs. Thoughts?

Thanks!

- JJ

[heus]

My 30P tubing made my sap smell like plastic last year. Many told me not to worry about it. It did not affect the syrup taste.

[adk1]

interesting, I never thought about it, but I will be installing 30P this fall and am interested in hearing some explanations. Did you contact the tubing dealer to ask?

[PerryW]

Funny, I remember tasting sap 40 years ago out of the old lamb tubing and I thought the same thing.

Did you taste the sap directly out of the tubing? If so, pour some into a cup and taste it. You might be smelling the plastic (much of taste is actually smell).

[Russell Lampron]

Boil it anyway. Every year I put up some new tubing and pipe somewhere and have noticed the same thing. Never had an issue with odor or taste in the syrup.

[Tweegs]

Our first draw from our first boil this year had that plastic taste you speak of.

We made several draws that day, about a half gallon each, but it is the first three I want to talk about.

The first draw we tested wasn’t quite syrup when we pulled off, tasted it and it had a noticeable plastic taste. I almost shut down and tossed everything then and there, but being our first run on the new evaporator, we decided to press on, tossing out the syrup made if need be. We didn’t have anything to lose by continuing to boil and it was a good chance to check the evaporator out.

Tasted the first draw of real syrup before filtering, and the plastic taste was still there. Filtered it and it wasn’t as strong.

The second draw we filtered before tasting, the plastic taste was even less noticeable.

Changed both the felt and pre filters before filtering the third draw. No plastic taste in that draw at all.

We finished out the day setting the first and second draws aside while combining the third and subsequent draws and later bottling them.

We let the first and second draws set out overnight and the next morning cracked open a bottle from the subsequent draws, tasting it first…no plastic.

The second draw had no plastic taste.

The first draw was barely noticeable, it went down the drain.

I, too, had put out a bunch of 30P without rinsing it.

Coincidence maybe?
I’m pretty sure every bit of sap handling stuff I used had been completely cleaned out prior, and there was nothing I hadn’t used before in the system, other than that new 30P.

Of course, the original tubing had been out since last year. Could have picked up the plastic taste from that, too, on the first run.

Everything is fine now, no off flavors, but lesson learned. I think I’ll just play it safe and run some clear water through the tubing prior to tapping next year.

[Typical8]

This is the first time I have had an issue with such a strong plastic taste on new tubing where we had to dump it on the ground. Both woods had 30P installed. After the first 2 runs went on the ground it still had a slight taste of plastic.

[Z/MAN]

When I was sweetening the pan I had that plastic smell coming off the boil. By the time I had my first draw it was gone and never smelled it again. All my syrup tastes great.

[michiganfarmer2]

Ive never noticed it

[adk1]

Well, that explains that. I will be doing a triple rinse on my tubing before I even put it up.