It’s official: the first three milk cans of syrup in 2023 are Grade A, Golden color and Delicate flavor. This is picture of the grading from today’s bottling. This is special for us. With our older equipment its difficult to make Golden Delicate syrup. This is our bragging picture.
Into the woods by 7:00 AM to check the R/O. The wash cycle ran all night again. Temperature reached 109 but that was after 15 hours. Something is wrong. We’ll check with the manufacturer tomorrow, but suspect the O ring (U cup) at the bottom of the membrane isn’t sealing tightly. Without a tight seal it doesn’t generate the needed friction to heat the water passing through the membrane during the wash cycle.
Emptied the milk can into the finishing pan by 8:30 AM. Started the fire on the finishing pan by 11:45 AM. Syrup ready for filtering by 1:00 PM. Started bottling by 1:30 PM. We monitored each step carefully so we didn’t make a mistake and mess up what we hoped would be Golden Delicate syrup.
Bottled some of the 500 ml maple leaf bottles so we have syrup to show off. Total bottling: 14 quarts; 33 pints; 11 250 ml.
15 overnight. Sunny today. Warmed to 36 late this afternoon but the wind was cold. Some melting. Tree pressure was -9 overnight but up to 15 this afternoon when it warmed. Trees started to drip slowly but not enough to collect.
A lot of snow on the ground for March 19th. Many years, the snow has melted by now. Last week’s snow storms of 20” are the reason we still have snow on the ground yet.
Back to the farmhouse by 3:30 PM