So, several years ago a new friend introduced us into Black Walnut Syrup. It was AMAZING!!
They had made several gallons on their farm in southern Missouri. Intrigued, we promptly began a new hobby the following winter. Now on our third season, it’s the highlight of the winter!!
Black Walnut syrup is very sweet—like Maple—but is much darker and richer in flavor. It’s hard to describe it, but it definitely doesn’t taste like shelled Walnuts. The sugar in Black Walnut sap is similar to Sugar Maple, but the volume of sap is much less. Because of this (and a few other factors), Walnut syrup is pretty expensive, for example, wholesale buyers are willing to pay $400/gallon finished syrup. Yeah—it makes my Maple syrup at $60/gallon look cheap!😆
Sap sugar content (brix) is highest in the dormant season, the winter or early spring. Sap flow is controlled primarily by the temperature. Ideal tapping temps are nights in the 20 degree range, and daytime highs in the 40’s. This causes a change in the pressure making sap flow up, and down…and out the tap spout🙂
Walnut sap doesn’t have much flavor, it’s kind of like creek water. Maple sap however, has a sweetish flavor. Both are refreshing and easy to drink.
Volume of sap produced by a single tree varies entirely, some seem ‘dry’ and will give very little sap, others have been known to give 6 gallons a day.
How to tap?? Besides the internet being full of directions, and Amazon selling a variety of taps, it’s pretty simple. Drill a 3/8” bit into the lower base of a Black Walnut tree (larger than 12” diameter) at a slight down angle, 2-3” deep. You want to pierce the bark, the soft cambium layer, and just into the hard wood. Then push or hammer your tap into the drilled hole, it should start dripping within a couple minutes.
The first few drops might be off color but it should become mostly clear. Then attach your hose/bucket/bag to your tap and head to the next tree😄. Sometimes it will literally pour out the tap hole when it’s first drilled!! Cool right?!
Sap—syrup ratio is usually 40-1, but can be as low as 70-1. In other words, 3-3 gallons of sap isn’t going to make much syrup! Sap needs to be kept cool—treat it like like milk. If it gets moldy or ropey—throw it out!
In order to get syrup, the water needs to be evaporated off so the sugar can become concentrated. We do this by boiling, shallow pans are the most efficient and quickest to burn dry. Early in the season I’ll just use a deep 4 gallon pot on our wood stove, or a couple of them. As we collect more sap, we start the Evaporator. A wood fired divided syrup pan with a spout. That’s when it gets real!! I love syrup season!
The sap will gradually get darker as it concentrates, while it’s still watery, but dark and sweet I’ll take it to the house to finish in smaller pans on the stove. Once it thickens, reaches 220degrees, or hits 60 brix, it’s done. Ready to filter and bottle.
We tapped two or three other tree varieties last year. Sycamore didn’t give hardly any sap, some kind of Maple did abundantly, the Oak and Hickory were dry. One kind tasted very much like a butterscotch syrup. I don’t know which kind—it was late in the season and my free help wasn’t very organized 😬
Filtering…pectin…bane of syrup making…
There’s a lot of differing opinions on removing pectin. You can make your own opinion on it. Last year we used a pectic enzyme that helps it break down, I thought it worked pretty good.
