Tomorrow I start packing more maple syrup. I’ll pack a 40 gal barrel into jugs. This will be dark syrup in a few weeks I’ll pack more amber syrup. I think if memory serves me I will still have one more barrel of dark after this one. That barrel is only a 26.5 gal barrel. Most of my barrels are the 26.5 gal size, SS. I only have 3 that are 40 gal SS. All barrels now must be SS.
I’ll post again when I finish packing the 40 gal. In cold weather I pack a 40 gal in one day, but when the weather is warmer I get over heated and take 2 or at times 3 days to pack on 40 gal depending on the sizes I need, I can pack a 14 gal batch into half gallons in about 90 minutes, get it labeled and priced and set on my shelving unit. If I need lots of pints and half pints it takes far longer.
Delay, when I opened the barrel it tested low density, I’m bringing it up to density. I sell all syrup at 66.9% sugar, some how this barrel got filled with 65.1% sugar. I’ll bring it up to proper density tomorrow and then start packing it either tomorrow or Friday. It all depends on how long i8t takes to get it boiled down to 66.9% sugar. I’ll need to keep a close eye on it and test it often. The main issue is that the longer I boil the darker it will get, so I need to test it when it’s actually at 66.9%, if it goes to 67.0 or 67.1% it will be darker and mixing in distilled water to get back to 66.9% will get it to the proper density but having been boiled longer it will be darker. Mixing in distilled water to get back to 66.9% sugar will not affect the color, it will still be darker. I don’t want it to get much darker or I could possibly make it into bourbon barrel aged maple syrup and then I’d need to open my last barrel of syrup that is dark and I’d certainly run out of dark well before Christmas and the new season which will be in Feb or March depending on the weather. I really don’t want that to happen. Right now it has great color (in the middle of the grade scale) and great taste, it’s just too thin. I could sell it at 66.5% (legal in New York State) but I chose not to, 66.9% is far better consistancy (and it is the regulation in Vermont. I chose to match Vermont’s requirements, always have).
It’s just a good thing I opened this barrel now, it’s possible if I had opened it in 2 months that it could have started to ferment and been unsaleable as grade A syrup. Had that happened I’d of had to sell it to a bulk syrup buyer who has legal ways to sell this a commercial syrup, used in things like cerial coating, or ingredients in many other products, but not as grade A maple syrup. Commercial syrup is worth only about 25-30% of what grade A is worth. I currently retail in half gallon jugs grade A at $1.03125 an oz, while the same quantity of commercial would only be worth $.2578125 an oz. Plus I couldn’t legally retail it, I’d need to wholesale it to a certified re-processor, at that price. As such I’d essentially lose about 75% of the value it has as grade A syrup.
Once I get it to 66.9% sugar I’ll update this post and confirm it’s still grade A or it became too dark. If too dark it will still be usefull for me by packing it in a recently emptied bourbon barrel and then waiting for it to age. When I age a 10 gal barrel it takes about 6 months, a 15 gal barrel takes about 8 months and a 30 gal barrel takes about 10 months. I’ve never packed a 40 gal barrel but my guess is it would likely take 12 months, before I could offer it for sale and right now I have 5 gal ready to bottle, will have a 30 gal ready late Nov or early Dec, and I only sell about 25-30 gal a year, so it would be 2 yrs before I could start to get my money back from it. However bourbon barrel aged syrup retails currently for $2.37 to $1.81 an ounce depending on the bottle size bought, the larger the bottle the lower the price per oz. Ao in the end I’d makle more even based on today’s prices but i would have needed to wait 2.5-3 years to realize it and who knows where this world will be in that much time?
It became too dark. The break point is 25% light transmission thru a specific test vial, this was 24%. I then went to a distillary and bought 2 recently emptied 30 gal bourbon barrels because they had no 20’s. I’ll put about 20 gal in each barrel to age it to become bourbon barrel aged maple syrup. That will take likely 6 or 7 months, but possibly only 5 months. The uncertainty is because I’ve only ever completely filled any bourbon barrel. A 30 gal when filled takes 8-9 months to age, while if I fill a 20 gal barrel it takes 6-7 months. The difference I think is because the amount of surface area inside the barrel decreases in relation to the amount of syrup in the barrel. For example going from a 20 gal barrel to a 30, the gallons increase by 50% but the surface area inside the barrel doesn’t increase by 50%. Now putting about 20 gal in a 30 gal barrel gives more surface area per gallon, coupled with the fact that each barrel gets rotated periodically thus it would contact the greater surface area while being fewer gallons. That’s why at 5 months I’ll check it, then based on the taste maybe every 2 weeks after if not then ready. I call them ready when the balance of taste is about equal between bourbon and maple flavors. This in the end, if it is ready sooner may cause me to buy 30’s more often to only put 15 or 20 gal of syrup in them. The cost of a 20 and a 30 is only $25 difference as of now, but IF the syrup is ready sooner that is worth the $25 extra.
I still have 1 more barrel of dark. It was from a different day and was a few days after this barrel that was low density. Hopefully the next one will be good. The low density one I opened a few days ago is the first time I’ve encountered low density in 22 yrs of making maple syrup. I don’t know what happened, but it happened. I use a test device called a Murphy cup that tells me what density the syrup should be at the specific temperature of the sample being tested. As such errors are not common, but obviously it happened once.
The next barrel will be opened this week once I’ve packed the darker batch into the bourbon barrels and cleaned all of the equipment. Once that tests good, I’ll create a new post.