Maple Syrup

We make maple syrup every year from the sap of American Sugar Maple and some Red Maple, in the late winter and early spring months of February, March and April. We’ve been doing this every year for last 20 years on my daughter’s 60-acre farm in Germantown, NY in the upper Hudson Valley of eastern New York (Columbia County) - one mile from the Hudson River. We tap about 400 trees and produce about 50-100 gallons of syrup most years.

how it's made

Our sugar shack is off the grid in the “back forty” so to speak, and so, we also cook it down an old-fashioned way — in a large open flat pan (3’ x 7’) on an earthen masonry stove (called an “arch”) over a hot wood fire. It’s a method that lends itself to making individual batches of about 5-10 gallons (of syrup) over a 1-2 day period. It’s a long cook, so our syrup tends to be darker, smokier and, we think, more flavorful than that produced by other more modern methods.