Maple Cream pics

[HanginAround]

Okay, I promised some pics of maple cream making, so here they are. A note on terminology... some places call maple cream something you spread, which is what we would call butter. What we make is called maple candy in some places, soft maple sugar, and fondant or nougat in others. This is the only area I know of where this product is really popular, and my uncle and cousin make several 130 lb batches a month all yr and almost daily during the season. Most is sold in 1/2lb and 1lb blocks, but a lot is also made into leaves of different sizes, and in tiny ice cream cones. He has had some leaves dipped in milk and dark chocolate in the past too... delicious! The cream is very fine textured and smooth, nothing like the crystally sugary leaves and blocks I've had in New England.

So... cook 12 gals of light syrup to I think +27, and here's the important part to make smooth cream... cool to about 80F. This is the biggest difference from the crystally stuff they make in NE, where they stir it quite hot. The sugar pan is in a cold water bath (see the tap on the wall?)



It helps to have some people to trade off with, because it takes about 20 minutes, and pretty hard on the arms at this cool temp:


The colour change at first is more because of the air getting stirred in rather than actual crystallization:


You'll know it when it starts to change, there is no mistake... once it starts, it all happens at once, the whole pan will set in about 30 seconds:






You now have a solid mass of fudge-like cream, so you break it all up into chunks for re-heating:


It goes back on the little candy arch for reheating only this time, in a double boiler rather than right on the fire... see the water pan under the sugar pan?


It's stirred for about 15 minutes until it is all hot and fluid again... the towels are to keep the water from boiling up on your hands:




Ready to go into the tins:


Mmmmmmmmmm:


Cooling:


Enough dregs in the pan for everyone to get a feed, plus some for public samples:


After they cool in the tins, they are taken out and set to air dry for several hours, usually overnight... this helps them shed a bit of moisture so they don't wet the papers so bad. They are then wrapped in very light paper printed with a label... sorry, I don't have a pic of them wrapped, I'll have to get one. Ideally, it should be soft enough to cut with a butterknife without having to hammer or pound, either flake, slice, or chunk it off to put on your toast, or eat by itself. Sometime if it's just a little soft, the syrup will seperate a bit and soil the paper, which isn't bad except it doesn't look good on the shelf. If it's too hard, it takes more work to chunk it off the block so is less appealing and harder to eat.

Hope you enjoyed. Questions and comments welcomed!

[Fred Henderson]

Nice tour and lecture. Thanks.

[Parker]

Very well done,,I think I will try that (on a much smaller scale)

[royalmaple]

Very interesting and great pictures,hanginaround.

I hear you parker, I may have to adjust the amount being made down just a hair, unless I want to make a good % of a seasons crop into a batch. Then I'd burn it or something and there goes a season in front of me.

Ouch, that would leave a mark.

[mapleguy]

Doesn't this guy do a good job? He's my son of course! Have a good day and good sugaring.
When I was a kid (some time back) the local producers used to cook this to a hard sugar temp, stir it hot, then fill sap cans half full. Since the cans are cone shaped it would come right out when coold and that was our sugar supply for porridge, etc. Just shave off whatever one need for the day.
there were no stainless pans around then, it was cooked and stirred in cast iron pots over an open fire.

[HanginAround]

Thanks guys, appreciate the comments.

Start small, maybe do it on the kitchen stove. Not absolutely sure on the temp, I'll try to find out for sure. Go slow, the higher you cook maple stuff, the bigger chance you have of burning it, don't get your heat too high. Of course if you guys are experienced candy makers, you know the issues and can jump in and experiment.

Edit: Dad, we posted at the same time. What about the temp, is that right?? Did your blocks of sugar get hard as a rock when you were young... how did you shave it off? Oh, and now that you posted a few times, you should go post in the "introduce yourself" thread.

[mapleguy]

Temp is + 26 or +27, depending on how hard you want it to turn out. If cooking older syrup ( 6 months or more) you may need to go another degree or 2, due to some of the sugars turning to invert sugar as it ages.

[rschoo]

Awesome guys! This is what I love about this site, someone taking the time to educate us all. Thanks!

[Russell Lampron]

Hangin'-

Great pics and descriptions of what is being done. How many gallons of syrup does it take to make that much candy? I remember seeing some molds like that around when my grandmother used to make candy when I was a kid. She never made that much at one time though.

Russ

PS: Stupid question, I went back and read it and saw that it says 12 gallons.

[markonsite]

Hangin; this is exactly what mine looked like. Thanks for posting the pics! I think the next batch I will cook it a degree or two less so it stays creamy, although the wife and kids loved it as fudge.

Thanks for the help!
Mark