Eastern Ontario 2014.

[gregord]

Hey you two on about cutting up tee shirts and chef's jackets, go to Fabric Land or any sewing center and you'll have lots of choose fabric to select from. I've done this for years as I make small batches less than ten liter's at a time. I always filter with a coarse mat'l out of my finishing pan at about 90% syrup into my stock pot, and then into the house on the stove boil to 100% syrup and filter through a cotton lining and then a cotton felt at one time.

[Bruce L]

Another bust today, after starting up the vacuum pump, releaser dumped maybe 4 or 5 times, then not worth running the pump anymore for the little spurts of sap that were coming in.

[Clinkis]

Same here. Turn on sap sucker this morning with hopes of at least a small run. Probably lucky to have gotten 10 gallons of 120 taps. Very disappointing....yet again! Here's hoping tomorrow.....

[Big_Eddy]

Al
Don't waste the syrup in your filter. Toss the filter in your sap pan and pour your fresh sap over it to rinse out as much of the syrup as possible. "Recycling" at its best.
Always leave at least one of the pre filters in the Orlon filter. They will trap most of the nitre. Lift the inner most one out with the nitre trapped in it allowing any remaining syrup to pour into the next. If you use an Orlon without a pre filter it will plug fast and when you rinse it into your next batch you are also adding the nitre back.

[Yellzee]

Nothing here either, getting worried this may really be a zero syrup season

[NTBugtraq]

As far as filtering...Bruteman, you seem too obsessed. It took 1.5 hours to filter the 1/2 litre I got 2 weeks ago with a coffee filter...the syrup is fine...and its time I don't have to do anything with, so who cares how long it takes? If you're doing small batches, put them into the filters before you go to bed and check them when you wake up...?? Do you realize how fine the stuff is you're trying to get out? The most common way of filtering for eons has been to not filter, and let it settle, then pour off all but the cloudy stuff...worked fine for me last year with my 10 taps.

As for sap today, I have been getting at least 1 gallon/hour outta 130 taps. Not nearly where I want to be, but best day so far this year.

Cheers,
Russ

[Galena]

If I may speak up....if Al has had formal training as a chef then yep, I can understand the obsession with getting it all just right. I've started up and run a food business of my own, and helped start up a fine dining restaurant. Several years later I worked in the kitchen of a fine dining restaurant, and at that level you HAVE to be a stickler for the small details, I saw it all up close at this restaurant, which has had the same chef for 15 years now.

Soo, imho, if Al does seem to be obsessing a little bit much, it's probably his chef background kicking in. Just sayin.

To get back on the topic of sugaring...got all of just over 1 l today, 3/4 of it from #7, the only red I am tapping this year; all the others are sugars. It also seems to LIKE northeast winds. Strange but true. *cue Twilight Zone theme*

[NTBugtraq]

I certainly wouldn't suggest a Chef could obsess too much about cooking anything...but sap isn't just something you cook, the trees, environment, and climate all have a lot to say...obsessing about what those elements are doing, aren't something a cook can control. No offense.

Cheers,
Russ

[Run Forest Run!]

If asked to come up with an adjective that describes sugarers, obsessive would be right at the top. You're in good company Al. Another mystery of the universe . . . why does perfection always seem to be one filter away.

[ARKmaple]

Filtering is one of those things I do not like to rush either. I take my sap down to near syrup at the bush. By the time I get it home it has cooled off so I filter it with some 75 cent cone filters I got from TSC. This gets ride of the bulky sediment. Then I take it down the rest of the way. When I do my final filter, I pour into a (clean new cotton) pillow case and let it hang from the rafters for the day or over night. Just an old trick my mother taught me.
Now to add to this conversation. My folks are telling me, that during the finishing they use to add an egg or milk to the syrup. But the good kind, they use to take the milk right from the bulk tank. This use to make the syrup very clear. There is something about adding eggs or milk to the syrup that makes me hesitant. Unless of course the eggs are cooked with French toast and the milk is in a glass on the side. Am I being a little to cautious and should go forth with the old methods.