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The rising of the sap is felt in the forest trees; frosty nights and sunny days call forth the activity of the settlers in the woods; sugar making is now at hand, and all is bustle and life in the shanty.

Catharine Parr Traill, The Canadian Settler’s Guide

With the words “Sap’s running!” one of Canada’s oldest industries gets ready to swing into action and thousands of winter-weary Canadians prepare to celebrate the coming of spring. For centuries, the annual tapping of maple trees (acer saccharum) has brought a joyful end to winter while providing both a sweetener and a flavouring, as well as an opportunity to enjoy good food, good fun, and good fellowship.

Long before European contact, the First Nations living in what is today eastern and central Canada and the northeastern United States would watch for the “sugar moon” to appear, for that was the signal that the magic sap was running and that they should gather in camps near the groves of trees to harvest it. It was a very special time for the First Nations, for it proved that the Creator was again providing for their needs. They would celebrate with feasting, thanksgiving, and the telling of stories and legends surrounding this ritual. As part of their festivals, the First Nations would also pass around ceremonial containers of syrup so that everyone could sample it and be strengthened by this energy-building medicine. They then feasted on favourite foods flavoured with maple syrup, such as soups, puddings, fish, fowl, and game. Quantities of the thick syrup would be poured into cooling troughs and kneaded by hand or with a paddle until it was thick and creamy.This soft sugar was poured into moulds and stored, to be eaten as a sweet or used as a flavouring during the coming year.

When the first settlers arrived in North America they were quick to copy the First Nations’ methods of tapping the trees with simple slits in the bark, an inserted reed, and a hand-carved wooden container to catch the sap. Although syrups can be made from red and silver maple and from butternut and black walnut, sugar and black maples have continued to be the favourites.

Elizabeth Simcoe, the wife of John Graves Simcoe, the first lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada, describes in her diary in March of 1794 the process already adopted by the farmers:

Wed, 19th — This is the month for making maple sugar; a hot sun and frosty nights cause the sap to flow most. Slits are cut in the bark of the trees, and wooden troughs set under the tree, into which the sap — a clear, sweet water — runs. It is collected from a number of trees, and boiled in large kettles till it becomes a hard consistence. Moderate boiling will make powder sugar, but when boiled long it forms very hard cakes, which are better … In a month’s time, when the best sap is exhausted, an inferior kind runs, of which vinegar is made. Cutting the trees does not kill them, for the same trees bear it for many years following. Dr. Nooth [Superintendent General Dr. M. Nooth was on the staff of the Quebec hospital at that time and was a friend to the Simcoes], at Quebec showed me some maple sugar which he had refined, and it became as white as West India sugar.The sap of birch trees will make vinegar.

In Canada today we assume that maple syrup production is limited to an area called the Maple Belt, which includes Ontario, Quebec, and part of the Maritimes. Sugar maples are now rare west of the Ontario border; however, Jonathan Carver describes a very different situation in Travels Through the Interior Parts of North America in the Years 1766, 1767, 1768 when he came upon Lake Winnipeg:

Lake Winnpeck, or as the French write it, Lac Ouinipoque, has on the north-east some mountains, and on the east many barren plains.The maple or sugar tree grows here in great plenty, and there is likewise gathered an amazing quantity of rice, which proves that grain will flourish in these northern climates as well as in warmer.

New arrivals were quick to copy the aspects of celebration as well, for French Canadians soon organized their own festivals for sugaring off at the sugar shanties or sugar shacks in the bush. Originally, a Festival de la Cabane à Sucre would have included only close family members and friends, and it would have been a very personal celebration. A great treat for the children (and young adults) at the sugaring off would be a taffy pull. Some of the syrup was set aside and usually taken into the kitchen to be boiled to a heavier consistency. Long lines of the thick syrup were dropped on pans of clean snow, and the young people were encouraged to twist the taffy around a spoon, fork, or stick in swirls and savour it slowly like a sucker.

The maple sugar harvest was not without its problems, as at least one newcomer, Samuel Strickland, described in Twenty-seven Years in Canada West or The Experiences of an Early Settler in 1853, when he found his cattle had enjoyed the contents of the sap barrel too much and had become very bloated, and only by puncturing the walls of their stomachs were they saved from death.

Sugar and imported flavourings were both scarce and expensive in the pioneer communities in Canada, so the availability of this sweetener and the subtle and unique taste that resulted from adding maple to foods were highly regarded.The traditional methods of making maple syrup and maple sugar remained virtually unchanged for nearly three hundred years in North America, until the middle of the twentieth century, when the modernization of techniques and the introduction of precision instruments, plastic tubing, and central evaporator plants replaced the old skills and equipment.

Unfortunately, over the years, many sugar bush owners tried to circumvent the long and tedious steps involved in the

harvest and refinement of the sap, and they began to look for ways to avoid the tapping, collecting, evaporating, and filtering process. As sap is about 97 percent water, it takes about 40 gallons to produce 1 gallon of syrup, so the combination of a labour-intensive industry and the costs of shipping the syrup to markets across Canada made this a very expensive product. Cheap, adulterated imitations began to appear, often composed of cane sugar and glucose seasoned with strongly flavoured, low-grade maple sugar or extracts of coal tar.

To stop these products,The Pure Maple Syrup Co-operative and Agricultural Association was organized in 1913.The goal of the Association was to assist the members to improve and market their products — and to educate the public. Sugar bush owners soon realized that an important part of public education was to open their properties (both bush and sugar shack) to the public. In the beginning, people were simply allowed to wander around, see how much was involved in this long, slow process that is compacted into a very short time (mid-March to mid-April), and hopefully buy gallons of syrup before they left. It wasn’t long, however, before the industry began to realize how fascinating this glimpse of the process was to the general public, including teachers and school classes, visitors from other parts of the continent or abroad, where sugar maples do not grow, and special interest groups.They saw the potential to educate in a broader sense, and perhaps even turn a profit at the same time.

Many sugar bush owners thus developed a complete package visit — a ride into the bush on a sleigh pulled by horses or a tractor, a tour of the operation using both pioneer methods and the latest technology, tastes of sap and finished syrup, and then, in many cases, a chance to take part in an old-fashioned celebration. Included in the last might be a table spread with an array of food: ham basted with maple syrup, baked beans sweetened with maple syrup, maple tarts, and maple sugar pie, all containing those important ingredients, maple syrup or sugar.There might be the opportunity to drop the thick syrup into the fresh snow so that it hardens and becomes a delectable morsel. Sometimes, the afternoon or evening celebration ended in dancing.

Many artifacts, such as hand-carved moulds, spiles, sap buckets, and cast iron pots, survive as mute witnesses to this Canadian tradition, an institution as well as a food source. In addition, almost every Canadian cookery book in every Canadian kitchen contains recipes using the sweet sap of the maple.

Catharine Parr Traill suggested this treat in The Canadian Settler’s Guide in 1855:

Maple Sugar Sweeties

When sugaring off, take a little of the thickest syrup into a saucer, stir in a very little fine flour, and a small bit of butter, and flavour with essence of lemon, peppermint or ginger, as you like best; when cold cut into little bricks about an inch in length. This makes a cheap treat for the little ones.

Maple Tarts

2 eggs

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup maple syrup

3 tablespoons melted butter

1 cup raisins or currants (soaked in boiling water and well drained)

Mix ingredients well and fill pastry-lined tart tins about two-thirds full with the mixture. Bake at 350ºF for about 20 minutes.

Maple sugar pie is a favourite with French Canadians everywhere. Here is a very basic recipe for it:

Maple Sugar Pie

1 1/4 cups maple sugar

3/4 cup cream

2 well-beaten eggs

1 tablespoon butter

pastry for a 9-inch single crust pie

Cook all four ingredients in a double boiler until thick. Cool. Pour into the single, unbaked crust. Bake at 350ºF for about 10 minutes, lower the temperature to 325ºF and continue to bake for about 50 minutes. Cool and serve.