Maple Syrup Time!

We officially boiled our first batch of maple syrup the other day and let me tell you....it is delicious! It is by far better tasting than the other maple syrups we have tried. So here's a few pictures of the process for those of you interested in seeing our setup:
We pump sap from our ATV storage container....

into our shack storage container...

then from there it goes straight into the boiler

Once it gets going and starts to sweeten up, it's time to make instant coffee with the sweetened sap water! MMMMMM so good!

Then we continue to boil and skim impurities from the foam naturally created on the surface

Once it starts to thicken up you filter/drain off the thick stuff and transfer it into the finishing pan with the propane stove. From there on you watch it carefully and test it with the hydrometer until it is ready to bottle.

Ta da!

Delicious! We processed around 40 gallons of sap in 10 hours. This was our first official run and we should be having a few more within the next couple weeks!