It's no surprise that we love maple syrup over here. Our Maple Syrup & Sea Salt nut butter blend is a huge hit with Trail Butter fans. We decided to share with you, a bit about the maple syrup process in New England.
Northern New England in March is considered the fifth season. The one nobody includes in the Visitors Guides across the region. Locally, it's known as "Mud Season". Luckily for us, it produces some of the finest harvestable products of the year. Corn snow (look it up!) and Maple syrup.
Both have some commonalities: Two or more hours in a boot pack/skin track will reward you with dreamy and creamy turns. Boot sucking mud, breakable crust, and mired trucks to obtain forty gallons of sap will eventually produce one gallon of maple syrup. Both as sweet as it gets.
Syrup producers range from simple backyard operations to large-scale multi-generation producers. The process is the same no matter the size:
- The sap is obtained by tapping trees (think of a spigot that doesn't shut off).
- The sap is gathered in a bucket or a line system that is collected into a larger container.
- Once delivered to the sugar shack it's boiled down through a process of osmosis and evaporation.
- Once the temperature reaches 219 degrees it's ready to be drawn off.
- After that, it's a filtering process, quality assurance, and off to a variety of storage containers.
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Todd Towle finds identity and place in the western mountains of Maine. For much of his adult life he has been fortunate enough to build a career in guiding clients into native trout and salmon on his home waters and capturing captivating images as a professional photographer. You can follow Todd on some of his journeys by following him on Instagram: @shapeofthejourney
