Maple Syrup (Acer saccharum)

With all that writing about sugar cane last week, I was even more tuned in to looking for alternatives than usual.  And a trip to Vermont and Montreal last weekend was an easy way to stock up on maple syrup.  It's getting towards the end of maple syrup season, and it's been a bumper crop, by all accounts.  In Montreal they were selling it by the can!

History: Maple syrup comes from a few types of maple, but the sugar maple is generally considered to be the best.  This tree actually grows in a fairly wide area, from as far south as Tennessee, as far west as Iowa, and north into Canada.  So why is maple syrup so associated with New England and Canada?  It comes down to a special feature of the maple tree in cold climates - starch storage.  This starch is stored in the roots and becomes sap in the spring, when conditions are exactly right.  This sap is what becomes maple syrup.

Worldwide Production: variable, but ~ 36.4 thousand tons (about 0.002% of the sugar cane output, and 0.015% of the sugar beet output): that's enough for just 0.2 ounces, or less than one little maple sugar candy, for every man, woman, and child in the world each year.

Growing: Sugar maples can and are grown ornamentally, but the primary stock of sugar maple is that which is found in the natural state, in hardwood forests. They have a nice habit of growing in sugar maple-only stands which helps concentrate production. The greatest concentration of maple trees, and thus the largest producing area, is Quebec.

Harvesting: The technique of sap collection hasn't change much from what the Native Americans were doing long before Europeans arrived on the scene. Basically, part of the trunk is incised and the sap is collected in a bucket. More modern collection involves sticking a plastic hose on the tap and sucking the sap into a central vat, but really it's the same thing.

Eating and Processing: The best quality maple sap still has only 2% sugar by weight, so there needs to be quite a bit of processing to get the final sugary concoction.  This primarily consists of boiling, such that 100 gallons of sap has to be boiled down to 2.5 gallons of syrup before it is ready for consumption!  The goal is ~66% sugar; beyond that point and the sugar begins to crystallize.  Then there is grading, where the higher grades are lighter colored and the lower grades are tastier (that's my bias...)  Another thing I did not know - the really low grade unusable gook is sold to the "pancake syrup" companies to add a maple flavor to their corn syrup!  

Health Information: Let's not kid ourselves - this is still sugar, and sugar in excess is a problem.  That being said, maple syrup has less fructose than other sweeteners which is probably a very good thing.  And it does retain a fair bit of manganese - 1 tablespoon has 33% of RDA!  As for all those flavor compounds that make maple syrup taste so good - who knows?

Sustainability: When done correctly, the collection process doesn't do too much harm to the tree. How do we know? Because this has been going on for hundreds of years and the trees are none the worse. The real sustainability issue for maples is beyond their control - it's about global warming. Even a rise of a few degrees will decrease the yield, as evidenced by reports of poor yields that we heard from Massachusetts farmers, compared to the still bumper crops up north.  As for the energy taken to boil all that liquid off yes, that is a consideration.

Where to Find: You can find organic maple syrup, which raises the question of what is the other stuff?  Other than that, its easy to find pure maple syrup in this neck of the woods and probably almost anywhere.

Relevant Blog: Dave's Maple Syrup Blog: This blog is by Dave Chapman, who just had his first season of maple syrup production and recorded it for posterity - I hope he keeps writing!

Bottom Line: It's astonishingly scarce, so consider yourself lucky if you can stock up on maple syrup, and consider it as a substitute for cane sugar!

References:
1. Wikipedia
2. Maple syrup nutrition facts
3. A sugar shack, from Flickr Creative Commons