[beccaprice]

I understand that, when boiling down maple sap to make syrup, the fumes cover everything with sticky sap. Has anyone made maple syrup at home, and if so is this true?

If you had a dragon creating the flames to boil down the syrup, what would be the best way to clean off the dragon? given that dragons are immune to fire, would making a big fire around the dragon work, or would it just crystallize the sap into maple sugar?

 

[Rick Gualtieri]

If you had a dragon creating the flames to boil down the syrup, what would be the best way to clean off the dragon? given that dragons are immune to fire, would making a big fire around the dragon work, or would it just crystallize the sap into maple sugar?

A hot spring maybe? Run him through a car wash? A small squadron of trolls with really big brushes?

 

[aimeeeasterling]

When we make maple syrup on a small scale (one tree's worth) at home, we don't get sticky sap, just nicely humidified winter air. Scientifically, you wouldn't think the steam from boiling down the sap would be sticky. After all, sugars shouldn't boil off, only the water.

Having a dragon boil off the sap would be great! Then we could tap several more trees without fogging up our windows.

 

[Douglas Milewski]

I've made my own maple syrup. (OH MY GOD was that good.)

Basically, you boil water until you have syrup. It's really hard to overboil because it's mostly water. Only when you get down to a low water content do you need to worry. We didn't have the sticky-stuff everywhere problem, but we only boiled down 5 gallons. If you are going to produce vast amounts of the stuff, then I can see the stickiness becoming an ickiness.

I can also see there being one very, very bored dragon.

To clean the dragon, I would just use water. Sugar dissolves in water. I suppose that a dragon would make it's own bath water hotter and hotter.

 

[555aaa]

Becca, you have the best questions on this board.

 

[Thisiswhywecan'thavenicethings]

There's not a lot of stickiness when you boil syrup even in larger quantities. The steam is just lovely smelling steam, not sugary. But I love the visual of a sticky dragon.

If he/she was a little over enthusiastic with the flame or managed an appropriately dragon-like snort or sneeze into the container because the steam tickled his/her nose, I could easily see a huge vat of syrup being blasted into the air to land on said dragon.

 

[dgrant]

My experience is with birch syrup - it's starts a lot thinner than maple, but gets to the same consistency in the end. You don't get sticky fumes over everything, just steam that smells kinda like french toast. However, by the time you factor in the splashes, spills, drips, and such, you end up with sticky all over anyway. (Or maybe that's just me.)

The sap collecting containers get cleaned with boiling water and wiped out every day. At then end, soaking in soapy hot water and scrubbing fixes everything (and you need to sterilize everything anyway, so it all works out.)

 

[Jennifer Lewis]

I've heard that the sap has to be boiled for so long that all the steam can peel wallpaper right off the walls