"katysails" wrote in message
| We tapped once...it is a lot of work and boiling the stuff down
| without the equipment (a still type thing is a tedious process, and since
| there is a sugar bush farm around the corner, I just buy it from them.

Have you tried the freezing method of rendering the syrup?? Works like a
charm and reduces the remaining stove time to a 1/4 of what it normally
takes. It's just a matter of freezing the raw syrup and removing the ice.
The syrup itself does not freeze as quickly so you reduce the water content
by a major factor. The result is the same.

CM