The History of Maple Syrup In America

Michigan Maple Syrup

Native Americans have been given credit as the first to discover that the sweet sap from a maple tree could be made into maple syrup. It is one of the few processes that was not introduced to interesting and wonderful stories about the origin and history of maple syrup, there are no authenticated accounts of how the process was discovered.
One of the most popular stories about the history of maple syrup revolves around a Native American chief who realized the clear liquid sap leaking out of a tree he had stuck his tomahawk into. As the day warmed up the sap dripped into a cooking pot on the ground. The chief’s wife, after tasting it and believing it tasted very good cooked the chief’s meat in it. The chief was so impressed with the sweet taste of the maple meat he named it Sinzibudkwud which means “drawn from trees”. Native Americans still quite often use this word when referring to maple syrup.
Before long they discovered that slashing or (wounding) a maple tree in early spring caused it to seep a sweet clear liquid which could be processed into a sweet product they found to be delicious. Many legends probably have been changed over the years, but the discovery of maple syrup most likely was accidental.
Over the years they learned they could gradually reduce the sap to syrup by continually refreezing it, discarding the ice, and stating over again. They would store up to 30 pounds of maple sugar in containers made of birch bark.
Eventually a few of the Native American tribes began to process the maple sap over fire. The tribal women would migrate to the maple groves or “sugar bushes” during early spring to process the maple syrup. They made troughs in which they collected the sap and brought it to the fire. The sap was cooked by adding heated stones. Newly heated stones would be added while removing older cooler stones to be reheated. Many early Native Americans would rather use sugar over salt and used maple syrup or sugar on their meat and fish.
Early settlers imitated the Native American methods to make their maple syrup. They would boil the sap on an open fire until it reduced down to syrup. It requires about 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of maple syrup, which was a labor intensive and time consuming operation. Not much changed for the next two hundred years, until during the civil war the tin can was invented. It didn’t take long before syrup makers discovered that a large flat sheet of metal would make a much more efficient pan to boil maple sap than using the older heavy rounded iron kettle.
Many of the original syrup makers were dairy farmers who made maple syrup and sugar for their own consumption, or a little extra income during the off season. They were always looking for a more efficient and easier way to make their syrup. Quiet a few innovative ideas and processes were developed over the years, but for the most part technology stayed the same for another century. In the 1960’s such a labor intensive and time consuming process made it impossible for small farmers to sustain themselves. They could not afford to hire the large number of people required to tap the trees and carry the small buckets to the evaporator house.
Finally with the energy crunch of the 1970’s another surge of technological breakthroughs occurred. Tubing systems were installed, and vacuum pumps added to bring the sap directly to the evaporator house from the trees. Pre-heaters that “recycle” heat which previously was lost were installed, and reverse-osmosis filters that remove a portion of the water out of the sap before it is boiled were developed.
Technological developments continue today with new filtering techniques, better tubing, “supercharged” pre-heaters, and improved storage containers.

Ken Asselin in webmaster for the Selections Guide series of websites. You can visit his Michigan Maple Syrup website at: ">www.michigan-maple-syrup.com

Article Source: http://www.wellnessarticlelibrary.com

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