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Maple syrup is a sugarener made from the sap of sugar bushs and is commonly used by many people in the United States, Canada, Europe and other parts of the world. The sugar from the juice of the sugar bush is carefully extracted retaining all of the natural sweetness coupled with essential vitamins and nutrients. Many people especially in the U.S. have recognized maple syrup as a key provider of energy and vitamins. Long before the British settlers set their foot on Indian soil, maple syrup has already been present for a long period of time. The Pre-Columbian Indians who live in the Northern part of North America were one of the first if not the first known people to have developed and produced maple syrup. A recent study indicates that the natives were already into the processing, development and consumption of maple syrup long before the arrival of the British. They used maple syrup, dried it more, and then used the canadian maple sugar in recipes.
The indians would find suitable maple tree trunks during the end of winter or early May period. They will then collect these saps and then boil it in order to let some of the water and liquid content evaporate. The remaining sugar and h2o will then be turned into a concentrate. The taste of the sugar will then be changed due to it being caramelized making it into maple syrup. The European settlers quickly integrated into their culture this maple making process. The year 1700 up to 1800 marked the significant changes in the maple syrup industry. Europeans, fur traders and natives were intensely involved in this sugar making industry as the maple syrup back then was one of the major providers of concentrated sugar. There were numerous developments brought about specifically by the British due to their more advanced technological advancements like metallurgy and toolmaking thereby advancing the maple making process significantly and allowed them to make things like canadian maple butter.
The maple syrup production as of the latest is basically centralized in the northeast part of North America. One stand full of sugar bushs is the Vermont stand, one of the world famous maple producing stands located in the U.S.. Vermont together with the other numerous maple stands in the United States are closely related to the other maple farms located in Canada and Europe. These farms use “sugar houses” or “sugar shacks” where sugar bush sap is heated in the hundreds. There are two major maple species that can be extracted from sugar bushs. The first one is the “acer saccharum” or the sugar maple. This maple syrup can be classified into average up to moderate sugar content maple syrup. The second one is the “acer nigrum” also known as the black maple. This is the kind of maple syrup classified as dark syrup because of its color due to the high sugar content from the sap it was extracted from. I like this type of syrup for pure organic canadian maple syrup.
The maple stands in Canada contribute to more than 80 percent of the total maple syrup created not only in the United States but the rest of the globe. According to a research organized last 2005, the maple syrup created from Canada totaled 25 up to 30 million liters per annum. The farms found in Eastern, Canada contribute most of these millions of liters of maple syrup. Again according to the research last 2005 Quebec has been the world’s largest creater of maple syrup, producing up to 75 percent of the total maple syrup for the whole world. The production of maple syrup in Eastern is supervised and controlled with the utilization of modern day volume-demand-management system. Data is input with regard to quotas about the world volume and demand for the maple syrup into the system. Voluminous orders of maple syrup by large scale supermarkets and other wholesalers of maple syrup are sent to this system everyday, amounting to hundreds or even thousands of orders per day. Something that is delishious is canadian maple candy.
The maple farm in Quebec also maintains a large amount of maple syrup reserves. The reason for this is simple, pertaining to a strategic preparation for situations of a double or triple increase in the need for maple syrup all over the world. As such, even if there is a rise of double or even triple the amount of maple syrup per year, they can effectively meet with such demand due to their overwhelming reserve of 20 million liters as of the year 2005. The next biggest creater of maple syrup is the Vermont farm located in the U.S. A total of 450 thousand gallons of maple syrup are manufactured and produced in this farm every year. The remainder with regard to the total need of maple syrup worldwide is being supplied by other farms beside Vermont and Quebec and are located in Maine, New York, Connecticut and other U.S. farm lands.
February, March and April are the months that are the center of maple syrup production. This largely depends upon the local weather conditions surrounding the maple stand. Warm and hot days as well as cold freezing nights greatly contribute to the development of the maple sap. The maple sap will eventually pour out from tap holes and other passages due to the constant rise and fall of the temperature. This sap will be the main ingredient used in order to make maple syrup. The juice will eventually be heated for long periods of time in order to harvest the liquid substance similar to sugar. Processing maple syrup needs ample amount of time and energy. It takes about half a day just to boil down 40 liters of maple juice. These 40 gallons will eventually be boiled down into 1 liter of maple syrup. You can just imagine if this was done manually, good thing there are now several improvements on machineries with regard to producing maple syrup. The quality and sugarness of the maple syrup as well as the time saved in processing it is all thanks to these modern day maple processing machines available in the market.
There are currently different grades of maple syrup consisting of several color classes based on Canadian and U.S. standards. There are 3 main grades of maple syrup in Canada namely Canada 1, 2 and 3 with Canada 1 comprising of extra light and light maple syrup, Canada 2 comprising of medium and amber colored maple syrup and Canada 3 comprising of dark maple syrup. In the United States there are mainly four grades namely Vermont Fancy, Grade A medium amber, dark amber and Grade B maple syrup.