Maple syrup run

[dswks]

Hi all. I wanted to share my first (and last) experiment using maple syrup as a sugar. I've been small batch distilling for the past 4 or 5 years, mostly running traditional corn/rye blends, so I'm not a total novice. I have a small, (20 qt) home made single stage pot still (no doubler), made from stainless steel, lead free brass, and copper.

I was given 5 quarts of dark amber maple syrup this spring. I saved 1 quart for pancakes, and used a gallon for distilling. I've been told that 1 gallon of syrup equals 5 lbs of sugar, so my wash was 1 gallon of syrup, @ 4 gallons of distilled water, and a packet of champagne yeast. It worked off extremely slowly for about 10 weeks! Mid way through that time, in an effort to speed things up, I aerated the wash by pouring it through a sieve, and added a little more yeast, but there was no detectable change in the rate of fermentation. While it was plodding along, I ran a traditional batch of corn, and a run of mulberry brandy, which both turned out well.

Finally the airlock stopped bubbling. The wash tasted pretty good; no sweetness left, and a nice maple after taste. The first pint bottle out of the still proofed in at 136, but there was no maple flavor. The second bottle lost 10 proof, but there was definitely a subtle maple finish. The third pint was still plenty strong at 116 proof, but it had an unpleasant finish - maple tasting at first, then decidedly metallic. The unpleasant taste on the tongue stuck around, too. Yuck. The temperature was holding steady at about 196 degrees so I kept going. The next two bottles were 106 and finally 96 proof and the after taste was strong, lingering, and very unpleasant. Temperature had risen to 200. Normally I would have run a sixth bottle for tails, but I threw in the towel at this point. The stuff was nasty.

I blended the first two bottles, and added distilled water to bring the proof down to 90. The result was ok, but nothing special. I poured the other 3 bottles right down the drain. I was afraid to use them as tails in my next traditional batch, thinking the ugly taste might carry forward.

So, that's my experience. Has anyone had better results with maple syrup?

[MichiganCornhusker]

That’s a shame you tossed that stuff.
I did maple sap once and had similar results, tasted nasty off the still, like rotten bark and wet dirt, maybe mushroomy.
It took a long time but it eventually came around and turned into a very nice maple spirit, all the funky flavors gone.
Make sure you keep some of what you made aside for a year to see what happens.

[dswks]

"Make sure you keep some of what you made aside for a year to see what happens."

Good tip, Cornhusker. I'll do that from here on in. I should have filtered the evil tasting stuff through activated charcoal a few times to see if it improved the taste. Dumping It was a knee jerk reaction which I won't repeat.