Maple sugaring, Jersey-style

Instructor Mindy Schmitt makes maple sugar with a wood-fired evaporator, at the Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center. Photo by Jeff Sovelove
Instructor Mindy Schmitt makes maple sugar with a wood-fired evaporator, at the Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center. Photo by Jeff Sovelove
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Instructor Mindy Schmitt makes maple sugar with a wood-fired evaporator, at the Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center. Photo by Jeff Sovelove
Instructor Mindy Schmitt makes maple sugar with a wood-fired evaporator, at the Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center. Photo by Jeff Sovelove

You don’t have to snowshoe to Vermont for real maple sugar.

As Morristown Green photographer Jeff Sovelove discovered last weekend, it’s being made right down the street, at the Great Swamp Outdoor Education Center in Chatham Township.

Photos by Jeff Sovelove. Please click icon below for captions.

Instructor Mindy Schmitt demonstrated how to identify a maple tree, how to tap it, how to drive the “spile,” and how to hang the bucket.  Then she went to a wood-fired evaporator to make the maple syrup.

The process takes some patience — you need one gallon of sap to make two ounces of maple syrup, Jeff reports.

 

You can learn more about this sticky business at 2 pm on March 7 and 8, 2015 (admission: $3), and at the annual  Maple Sugar Festival on Saturday, March 14,  from noon to 4 pm at the education center, at 247 Southern Boulevard.

Festival visitors will have a chance to make their own maple cream, take a guided “Hike Through Maple Sugaring History,” and buy their own maple sugaring gear. Fresh local maple sugar products will be for sale, too, and a food truck will be on site. Crafts and games for children also will be provided.

Admission to the Festival is $4, rain or shine. Call 973-635-6629 for more details.

 

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