Maple Syrup

December 17th is National Maple Syrup Day. What a good day to have some pancakes, waffles, or French toast topped with maple syrup. Some cooks substitute it for corn syrup in recipes, and you can find some baking recipes online. In addition, it's fun to experiment to see which maple syrup surprises your family likes.

Red, black, or sugar maple trees are most often tapped to obtain maple syrup. In cold climates, these trees store starch in their trunks and roots before winter. The starch is converted to sugar and rises in the xylem sap when spring comes. This is the time to drill holes in the trunks of the maple trees and collect the sap in buckets. The the sap is heated to boil out some of the liquid and leave a syrup. This process originated with Native American groups, but European settlers soon adopted their practices and improved them over time to meet their needs.

Although maple syrup and sugar have about the same amount of sucrose, maple syrup has some health benefits refined sugar does not, the main one being antioxidants. These antioxidants fight free radicals that are known to cause serious health problems. The darker the syrup, the more important antioxidants it has. So today is a good day to indulge in a good helping of maple syrup.

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