Southwell Sugar Shack Maple Syrup
Sugar Bush
In the time before borders divided the land, the earth bore plenty and gave freely her bounty. Each spring the great spirit provided morel mushrooms, ramps, cattail shoots and maple syrup. Maple syrup poured thick and amber from the trees. One tale, as published on the Michigan Maple Syrup Association website, tells of a spirit prince Glooskap who was, one morning, seeking his people. Glooskap comes to the village to find it empty. He searched and searched, finding the people in a maple grove, lying on their backs drinking the syrup directly from the trees. Glooskap was angered by this idleness. At his command to stop and begin work, the people yielded not. As a spirit prince, Glooskap had special abilities, and with these, he fashioned a bark “container with water and flew back to the maple grove. When he poured the water over the trees it diluted the syrup so it was no longer sweet”. For the people to enjoy syrup, they would have to gather the sap and boil it. But, to cement the lesson of industry, the sap would only run for a short time each year, forcing collection and boiling and storing so the syrup could be enjoyed all year.
More than a few creation style stories exist about various Indian spirits and gods and changing syrup to sap. The common theme among the tales is one of work. To appreciate the good, one had to work at the task to get that good, the syrup.
My first boil
My first experience with maple syrup was in the spring of 1973 in the back yard of a neighbor in Traverse City. Men worked, hauling buckets of sap to two boiling pans propped up over re-bar horses and each had a substantial fire under it. Inside was the sap boiling away to syrup. Every few minutes one of the men would ladle off some of the foam which had collected in one or another of the corners of the pan. “Impurities,” I was told “make the syrup cloudy and taste off.” In the yards around me hung buckets from spigots pushed into holes drilled into trees in each of the neighbors’ yards. A community’s contribution for a portion of maple syrup.
Bucket brigade
Many buckets hung in those neighborhoods. Residential maple syrup production needs little more than enough sap to boil and a willing cook. Commercial syrup is a horse of another color. In no particular order commercial maple syrup needs 2000-10000 taps, the pipes to get the sap to a contain. You need a container. A large stainless steel one is preferable. From the storage container the syrup goes to an evaporator—a fancy boiling pan. Modern systems can employ reverse osmosis in which some water is removed before the sap starts boiling reducing the boil time. Then some way to bottle, cap and label the bottles. Technology has made the production quantity increase, but the fundamentals are the same: gather sap and boil.
Boiling away the water, 39 gallons of water from 40 gallons of sap is a basic ratio, produces one gallon of the amber goodness we know as maple syrup. Last year, as Del Southwell of Southwell Sugar Shack says, “sugar content was so low that 80 gallons of sap made a gallon of syrup. Sugar content of sap is in God’s hands.” Maple syrup producers have few pests to content with, but they can be more then enough to manage. Squirrels can chew through the tubes which transport the sap to the storage container. Tent worms can wreak havoc on trees and the effects of that won’t be known till the next spring’s sap run.
Despite the sugar level of the sap, the syrup is boiled to a color and a level of transparency which determines its grade. There has been a move amongst maple syrup producers to change grading from Grade A or B to one seemingly a bit more confusing. All syrup is Grade A with these levels, Golden, Amber, Dark, and Very Dark (formerly Grade B.) Preferences and needs are different, but generally speaking, the darker the syrup the more robust the flavor. Southwell and some of his staff have been trained and certified in grading of syrup.
How Southwell does it
Southwell taps trees on about 60 acres of land. Trees for sap production are best when at least 40 years old and in Michigan, about 1% of “Michigan’s maple forest resource is used in maple syrup production” (MMSA). Michigan ranks 5th in the nation for maple syrup production. Much of Southwell’s production is available at the store, but they have internet sales also. In addition to maple syrup, they also produce maple sugar.
Maple sap, syrup and sugar have found a rather new niche of late: the health food market. Unlike honey, maple sugar and syrup is vegan. Southwell, which has earned a Certified Organic certificate, sells maple sugar which can be used in roughly half the ratio of granulated sugar in cakes and cookies and muffins. A full maple diet would include maple sap as the beverage of choice. As written by Seánan Forbes in his article for www.rodalesorganiclife.com “A university of Rhode Island study identified 54 beneficial compounds in maple water, including numerous antioxidants, manganese, calcium, potassium and zinc.” Maple water isn’t without detractors and the claims made should be researched. Maple syrup has 50 calories per tablespoon. If your house is like mine, Sunday’s are calorie free days, so the syrup pours freely.
March is Maple Syrup Month in Michigan. Sap should be flowing and buckets hung aplenty in various neighborhoods. Use your nose to find the fires fueling the syrup making. Find your neighbor, bring hotdogs and buns and have a day. Syrup making is about a 300 year old Michigan tradition, and we Michiganders like little more than tradition.
How to eat it
On pancakes, of course. Here’s our favorite fluffy pancake recipe. See the recipe page for more ideas including the Banana pancakes or chocolate waffles.
I’ve used Maple syrup in Maple Walnut bread, the thickening for doughnut glaze and many more confections and baked goods.
Contact Southwell Sugar Shack on their website or, if you are in Northern Michigan, give them a call. Their number is 1-(231) 492-0159.
This article was intended to run in The Central Lake News, but factors beyond all control prevented that. The publisher deferred the rights to the author and he presents it here because Southwell Sugar Shack is worthy. As this was intended as an article, it reads as one instead of an interview. Since I communicated with Del at length, it bears the spirits if not the appearance of an interview. I think Del would agree he was suitably questioned.
