In our area the spring equinox comes close to the traditional weekend of the maple sugarhouse open houses, fun places to visit to celebrate spring and see how maple syrup is made. Sadly though, probably due to climate change, the sap stopped running and the last boil of the season happened on Friday, two days before we got to Goshen Hill Maples. The friendly couple running this one, though, had a fire going and boiled water to illustrate the process to visitors.
It seems the days of tapping a tree and hanging a bucket under the spout to collect the sap are gone by. These days tubes bring the sap to the holding tanks and then to the evaporator. It takes about 40 gallons of sap to yield 1 gallon of syrup. One tree will produce about 10 to 20 gallons of sap, or a quart to a half gallon of syrup.
We bought two quarts of their maple syrup which should last us for a year. 🙂 I have a salmon recipe that uses maple syrup in the marinade which we have at least once a week. Our days of eating pancakes or waffles with maple syrup are long gone, but we have many fond memories of the deliciously sweet weekend breakfasts.