It’s almost time to tap the birch trees again. Even though it was -20F in town as I wrote this, I know spring is almost here and the weather will start warming up during the day. This is our fourth year in a row tapping the trees around the yard and it has become a favorite spring activity for my children and me. We’re not serious birch tappers. We don’t try and make money off of it or even try to make enough syrup to last a whole year. We simply tap the trees to enjoy the sap seasonally. And oh what a joy it is.
Even though we only tap three or four trees a year, those trees can easily produce 20 gallons of sap. So the question is then, what do we do with it all? How can we easily use all the sap without buying any fancy equipment? Here is what we came up with, our top six favorite things to do with birch sap.
Drink it Fresh
This is our favorite thing to do with birch sap. My kids and I drink it every day, often right out of the bucket. It’s clean and fresh-tasting, similar to the smell of cut grass. Just make sure you filter out debris or small bugs that fall in the sap. The sap doesn’t store much past a 5 or 6 days so drinking the day of is the best.
Sourdough Starter
Making sourdough starter is actually very easy. I’ve successfully made it two years in a row now, just to see if I could, and the resulting bread is just as tasty, if not more so than any other sourdough bread. Here is my recipe if you want to read more on making your own Birch Sap Sourdough Starter. And here is the recipe for making the bread, How to Make Sourdough Bread.
Making Coffee
Making coffee with birch sap is pretty tasty. I don’t even like sugar in my coffee but the birch sap adds just a touch of sweetness. Just boil the sap instead of water for your french press, single cup filter, or pour the sap directly into your coffee maker. Yum!
Syrup
Birch syrup is not that hard to make. You don’t need to have fancy equipment as long as your not dealing with large quantities of sap. I tap three or four trees a year and boil down the sap in my kitchen on the stove. After several hours of simmering, and filtering through a coffee filter to remove the ‘sand grit’, I end up with about a pint. Here are some very good instructions on tapping trees and making small quantities of birch syrup.
Take it to a Syrup Making Cooperative
Take your sap to a cooperative. In Fairbanks, there is a cooperative called One Tree Alaska you can take your sap to and they will boil down all community members’ sap and give you a percentage of the syrup they make. The rest of the syrup is sold to fund education programs. If you’re in the Fairbanks area you can find more information at One Tree Alaska.
Kombucha
This is another easy project that adds a bit of zip to your already flavorful Kombucha. Just replace all cold water in any kombucha recipe with birch sap. Here is our amazing kombucha recipe if you’d like to try it.
There you have it. Six easy projects to try with birch sap. Aside from the birch taps you don’t even need any fancy equipment, just the items you probably already have in your kitchen.
Those are my favorite ways to use sap, what are yours?
I love this! Can any birch tree be tapped? My mum has some she planted many years ago in Sonoma county. It might be fun to get sap from them.
Hi Wendy! As far as I know you can. Up here we tap before the leaves come out on the trees, and when the nights drop below freezing and then warm above freezing during the day. So does that happen in Sonoma County? I think the worst-case scenario would be that you’d tap a tree and you’d only have a few days before the sap became yeasty and didn’t taste quite as good. It’s worth a try though.