1Hello everyone.
2Today we're going to look at another natural food product
3and that's maple syrup.
4What is this exactly?
5Well, maple syrup looks rather like clear honey,
6but it's not made by bees;
7it's produced from the plant fluid, or sap, inside the maple tree
8and that makes maple syrup a very natural product.
9Maple syrup is a thick, golden, sweet-tasting liquid
10that can be bought in bottles or jars
11and poured onto food such as waffles and ice cream
12or used in the baking of cakes and pastries.
13It contains no preservatives or added ingredients,
14and it provides a healthy alternative to refined sugar.
15Let's just talk a bit about the maple tree itself,
16which is where maple syrup comes from.
17So, there are many species of maple tree,
18and they'll grow without fertilizer in areas where there's plenty of moisture in the soil.
19However, they'll only do this if another important criterion is fulfilled,
20which is that they must have full or partial sun exposure during the day and very cool nights,
21and I'll talk more about that in a minute.
22There are only certain parts of the world that provide all these conditions:
23one is Canada,
24and by that, I mean all parts of Canada,
25and the other is the north-eastern states of North America.
26In these areas, the climate suits the trees perfectly.
27In fact, Canada produces over two-thirds of the world's maple syrup,
28which is why the five-pointed maple leaf is a Canadian symbol
29and has featured on the flag since 1964.
30So how did maple syrup production begin?
31Well, long before Europeans settled in these parts of the world,
32the indigenous communities had started producing maple sugar.
33They bored holes in the trunks of maple trees
34and used containers made of tree bark to collect the liquid sap as it poured out.
35As they were unable to keep the liquid for any length of time,
36they didn't have storage facilities in those days,
37they boiled the liquid by placing pieces of rock that had become scorching hot from the sun into the sap.
38They did this until it turned into sugar,
39and they were then able to use this to sweeten their food and drinks.
40Since that time, improvements have been made to the process,
41but it has changed very little overall.
42So let's look at the production of maple syrup today.
43Clearly, the maple forests are a valuable resource in many Canadian and North American communities.
44The trees have to be well looked after
45and they cannot be used to make syrup until the trunks reach a diameter of around 25 centimetres.
46This can take anything up to 40 years.
47As I've already mentioned,
48maple trees need the right conditions to grow and also to produce sap.
49Why is this?
50Well, what happens is that during a cold night,
51the tree absorbs water from the soil,
52and that rises through the tree's vascular system.
53But then in the warmer daytime,
54the change in temperature causes the water to be pushed back down to the bottom of the tree.
55This continual movement, up and down,
56leads to the formation of the sap needed for maple syrup production.
57When the tree is ready,
58it can be tapped and this involves drilling a small hole into the trunk
59and inserting a tube into it that ends in a bucket.
60The trees can often take several taps,
61though the workers take care not to cause any damage to the healthy growth of the tree itself.
62The sap that comes out of the trees consists of 98% water
63and 2% sugar and other nutrients.
64It has to be boiled so that much of that water evaporates,
65and this process has to take place immediately, using what are called evaporators.
66These are basically extremely large pans,
67the sap is poured into these,
68a fire is built and the pans are then heated until the sap boils.
69As it does this, the water evaporates, and the syrup begins to form.
70The evaporation process creates large quantities of steam,
71and the sap becomes thicker and denser, and, at just the right moment,
72when the sap is thick enough to be called maple syrup,
73the worker removes it from the heat.
74After this process, something called 'sugar sand' has to be filtered out
75as this builds up during the boiling and gives the syrup a cloudy appearance and a slightly gritty taste.
76Once this has been done,
77the syrup is ready to be packaged so that it can be used for a whole variety of products.
78It takes 40 litres of sap to produce one litre of maple syrup
79so you can get an idea of how much is needed!
80So that's the basic process...