SC - Sugar Maples

[Tim & Dee]

The question is:
>> Is/are there any sugar maple trees in Europe?  And what is Sweet Water?

> Hm, no, I don't think so. At least not natively (modern day imports is a
> different ballgame). I *could* be wrong, though. If I remember
> if^H^Hwhen I get home from work tonight I'll try to check the latin
> names.
> /UlfR
> My memory is that both maple and larch are new world trees.  I'm basing
> this on reading reports of chests made from both of these being found in
> Iceland and used as supporting evidence of trips to the New World.
>
> Elaina

We didn't think that they were native to Europe, but neither one of us are "tree experts".


> You *can* get a sweet syrup from birches, but I don't know if it was
> done in the middle ages.

> There is some precedent in using tree sap as a fermentable sweetener. In
> her text, A Second Handbook of Anglo-Saxon Food & Drink: Production &
> Distribution (page 229), Ann Hagan notes "Saps were apparently
> fermented: Bartholomew Anglicus observes that birch and honey would make
> a strong drink, and sycamore saps could be fermented with ale or yeast."
> C. Anne Wilson further comments, "Birch tree wine was fermented from the
> spring sap tapped from tree trunks in Sussex and in the Scottish
> highlands. The sap could also be brewed as ale with only a quarter of
> the normal allowance of malt." in Food and Drink in Britain from the
> Stone Age to the 19th Century (page 383).

This is interesting.  So you can make ale/beer/etc. with tree sap?!  WOW, the things you learn!! :-)

> Acer sacchrum (sugar maple) does grow in Europe. I think it is native there.
> Percival

Are there different varieties of sugar maples?

Thanks for all the info.

Dierdre

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