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Maple syrup is a traditional and whole sweetener that has consistently played an integral part of the economies of North America ever since Native Americans first taught the early European settlers how to tap maple trees and boil down the sap.
Maple syrup derived early in the season at the time of the spring thaw runs sweet and clear. It takes about 20-30 gallons of boiled down sap to make one gallon of light amber colored syrup, labeled as Grade A. This is the maple syrup typically available in the supermarket.
Late in the season, maple sap thins out and grows watery. Much more than 20-30 gallons of sap must be boiled down to yield Grade B maple syrup of equal sweetness. Boiling down more sap to concentrate the sweetness also concentrates the flavor and nutrients. This late season syrup is darker, more maple flavored, and higher in minerals than the Grade A syrup and is labeled as Grade B.
The blander, lighter syrup typically commands the highest price as consumers tend to prefer sweetness without too much flavor.
The Growing Popularity of Grade B Maple Syrup
I’ve been a fan of Grade B maple syrup for years and have enjoyed the lower price point despite its relative rarity in comparison to Grade A.
As consumers have moved further away from refined sweeteners in recent years, however, the price of Grade B has risen as has its availability.
Years ago, I used to be able to call up my maple farmer in Chautauqua, New York who I got to know spending summers there as a youth visiting the farmer’s market on Saturday mornings and ask for a few gallons of Grade B to be shipped and it was no problem. Then, it became much harder to come by. In addition, the price for this homely sweetener kept going up with Grade B sometimes even higher in price than Grade A!
In the past couple of years, I’ve purchased maple syrup from Vermont as the price was really fantastic. The first few gallons were excellent quality, and then suddenly, I received a gallon of maple syrup from Vermont labeled as Grade B but it was in fact Grade A!
The first time this happened, I thought it was just a simple mistake because the next gallon I got was correctly labeled Grade B. Then, the “mistake” happened again and then again.
At that point, I realized that this might be happening on purpose – the Grade B was sold out so some gallons of Grade A were labeled as Grade B maple syrup to meet the increasing consumer demand with the hope that the consumer wouldn’t notice the difference.
Then I heard of this happening to other folks buying maple syrup from other sources as well!
Make Sure Your Grade B is Really Grade B
The motto of this story is to check your Grade B maple syrup and make sure you are really getting what you paid for!
Fortunately, it is easy to tell the difference. Grade B maple syrup is much much darker than Grade A so it is easy to tell the difference if you put them side by side. What I do is keep a small glass bottle of Grade A from the supermarket in the pantry to use as a comparison test each time I buy some Grade B in bulk.
More change is on the horizon, however!
By 2013, new international standards for labeling maple syrup will come into effect with the term Grade B no longer used.
Once these new standards come into effect, all maple syrup will be labeled Grade A with four identifying colors: Golden, Amber, Dark, and Very Dark.
Have you purchased what you thought was Grade B maple syrup only to discover that it was really Grade A? If so, what did you do? Did you complain or just switch suppliers?
Please note also that there is a significant difference between conventional and organic maple syrup producers. This article spills the beans on these little known production practices that will have many consumers switching brands in a hurry!
Do you just love Grade B maple syrup? If so, here’s a healthy, homemade maple kombucha salad dressing to try.
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
More Information
Coconut Sugar: A Healthy and Sustainable Sweetener
Don’t Fall for Xylitol
Sugar Alcohols Harm Gut Health
So when they change the labeling, will you want to buy very dark?
Either Dark or Very Dark. The darker the better.
Great article, as usual…was wondering if you have a Twitter account? Was looking for you on there! 🙂
Robin can you tell me how can add my picture in my id for the blog,thanks
I just don’t buy maple syrup and haven’t for a couple of years. There seems to be many issues with what the providers are doing with their trees to make them produce syrup.
I hadn’t heard of this Tina. What are they doing to the trees ? 🙁
That is too bad that you are not buying maple syrup, can you explain what producers are doing to their trees. I personally know of no producer that would do anything to shorten the lives or lower the health of any maple tree.
Why buy grade B over A?
This is explained in the post.
mary grade B is much better in flavor and also have more minerals,it is more pricey but t is worth it
There is awealth of misinformation in this post and it’s comments though maple maniac and Andrew de Livron have tried to set the record straight. Grade B is an inferior grade that did not make the cut as grade A because of a defect in color, clarity, and/or taste.
Grade has absolutely nothing to do with mineral content!! Mineral content will be roughly equal between grades since most minerals are filtered out as sugar sand..
Darker color and deeper flavor is mostly due to microbial action which is more likely as the season progresses and the weather warms. Sugars are degraded into simpler ones that more readily carmelize. Prolonged cooking also encourages carmelization and thus a darker color and more pronounced taste.
If you like the dark stuff as many do then go for it but don’t do so because you think it is healthier. It is not
Many of these comments are misleading or just plain wrong. Maple syrup grades have nothing to do with the quality of the syrup. ALL maple syrup is held to the same quality standards. There is no such thing as “inferior Grade B”. The grades indicate the color of the syrup and the strength of the maple taste. Grade A in its three levels is light to medium amber with a delicate maple taste and is from sap tapped early in the season when sugar content is at its highest. Grade B is late season sap where the sugar content could be as low as .9%, needing far more sap to get the same yield, thus a higher concentration of flavor and darker color. Grade C is at the absolute end of the tapping season and is the lowest sugar concentration of sap. It is very dark and heavy in taste and is typically only used in commercial baking and flavoring.
Tastes have changed over the years, it used to be that anything other than what is now Grade A Fancy was barreled and sold to the commercial market. Now people value the pronounced maple flavor of the “lower grades”. Since they were more affordable in the past people became accustomed to them and the law of supply and demand took over from there…
I find it very funny that the author thinks she was cheated by receiving “Grade A” syrup labelled as Grade B, as if the Grade A was inferior…
Do some research people…
“It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove any doubt.”
We also live in NY and produce our own maple syrup, just for our family. Your one fact was wrong, it take roughly 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of syrup. Beth is correct, we had a lousy winter this year and only got half the amount of sap/syrup of what we usually do. Also, the different grades come in many different colors. I would say both those in the jars above are grade B, but they came from different batches which is why the color is different. The lighter one is kind of an in between, as the sap gradually changes. Grade A is a blond color, or golden, almost pretty much see through. You can actually buy a color guide from maple syrup supply companies. It has many different bottles with different color grade syrups to help you judge if your syrup is A or B.
The one on the right is Grade A. It exactly matches the color of the Grade A I purchased at the supermarket.
Also, it may take you 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of syrup but other areas may take less as discussed here: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2011/05/making-the-grade-why-the-cheapest-maple-syrup-tastes-best/239133/
Well, I am someone who actually makes the product and has friends who make it for a whole NE distribution. I have never ever had a gallon of syrup from 20 gallons of sap. If that was possible if have twice as much maple syrup as I do now! The least amount I’ve gotten was a gallon of syrup out of 36 gallons of sap. My friends with the maple company say the same thing! Whoever that reporter is who wrote that article you referenced needs to actually get outside and make his own to see that 20 gallons is impossible. Even 30 would be hard to believe.
As one who has (in the past) made many hundreds of gallons of maple syrup, I agree with you. 40 to 1 is a much more realistic average. As for light or dark, tastes have changed since I was involved. Anything darker than Grade A Light went right into the barrels for industrial use. Now everyone seems to affect a liking for the more flvourful (brackish) dark. The main factor in darker syrup by the way, is rain runoff from the trees.
As a large scale sugarmaker I would like to comment on the article and also some of the comments that I have read.
First The sample that I am looking at on the top looks like Grade C to me, Also known as commercial. But without a sample to test I can not be sure.
Second, I am not sure about the 20-30 gallons to make a gallon. I have none of those trees on my property that is for sure. The industry standard is 40:1. The actual ratio is something close to 87.1 gallons of 1 % sap. In a general conversation people will discuss sap at 2%.
Now, as far as buying from Trader Joes, or any big retailer. When you purchase from them you are getting what is called a blend. The packer takes multiple barrels and blends them all together to get the color that he wants. That is packaged and sold as is. Now personally I would prefer to buy from a reputable producer. You are more likely to get the best of his crop. What people don’t really understand is maple syrup will taste different from batch to batch, why? No idea. But you will never get the “best” buying from a retail store.
Now the description of Grade A…… That represents 3 other “colors”. In Vermont we have Grade A Fancy, Grade A Medium, and Grade A Dark. So saying Grade A does not really mean a lot.
Maple syrup is a wonderful commodity that is under utilized that is for sure. But to the person who wrote this article, please get the facts next time before writing about maple syrup. There are enough misleading facts out there and there are plenty of good locations for information.
Go to Vermont Sugar Makers Association for more info.
It is good to have someone who actually produces or is directly involved n the industry speak on this. I grew up in Ohio and still reside here, we are one of the top producing Maple Syrup States as well. I studied maple production in college as part of getting my Degree in Forestry, my father would cook down some sap occasionally from his woods as a winter project, and I live near a region in Western Ohio where several small Amish farms produce and market their own syrup. Yes, while its apparent that the author didn’t always get the same color syrup as “her” Grade B syrup, I personally would not be complaining about getting what is considered as a higher grade for my dollar. It intrigues me how often I read articles online like this, that not in every case, but in many, the author never stepped foot personally out in the field they are writing on. As the season progresses the mineral content does increase, as many have stated above. I have seen where the color of the sap starts to get cloudy and I have even tasted it having a more bitter taste before cooking. This is why Maple syrup is only being produced in that short window of time during the late winter/early spring.
Ack! My husband’s uncle used to make the maple syrup we had. It was an annual gift to receive a few gallons in the mail. But he passed away recently and we have to buy ours. I am no expert when it comes to maple syrup, but even his early syrup was dark and heavy tasting and far superior to anything I have ever bought anywhere. Maybe it was his process and maybe it was the having cows in the orchard with the maple trees but I don’t think I’ll ever have maple syrup that good again. I need to get on my game and find some better sources.
Back to Trader Joe’s…..So is TJ’s grade B really grade B after all? It’s pretty light in color compared to your photo.
If it’s not the dark color like the one in the left of the photo, it’s not Grade B. At least not to me!! Grade B is very dark.
The grade B I get at TJ’s is very dark. Interesting……
Just got my bottle of TJ’s grade B out and it is not as dark as the one on the left, kind of in-between the two. Maybe it varies from batch to batch??
i saw a big bottle of B at Joe’s that was very dark, and a smaller organic B that was less dark.
anyway, should we be concerned about buying organic syrup? i don’t know if there’s a compelling reason to…
how interesting! what a great post! i had no idea!!
Well I hope you called them out and they were honest to give you back the price difference.
This winter was too warm up here in the East to get a lot of maple syrup. The trees just didn’t produce so the farmers should have raised their prices greatly for Grade B because of it’s rarity this season. It sounds like they chose the other route so as not to lose customers but this defeats the whole idea of supply and demand to keep them in business. I’d suggest switching to a different sweetener during years like this.
I had no idea about how the weather affects maple syrup production but of course this makes sense. I’ve been using more coconut nectar which is wonderful … I wonder how we as consumers can know about how the weather is affecting maple trees each year so as to be aware of what might be happening down the road? I had no idea that something was up until I received maple syrup incorrectly labeled.
The problem may become systemic. Apparently, there is some anticipation that global warming will be seriously affecting maple syrup supply in the future:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/03/us/03maple.html?pagewanted=all
We really need to push for more regulation over carbon emissions.
@ Ann: I wouldn’t believe anything written in that rag. Global warming? Oh. My. Gosh. It’s been debunked about a hundred times just this year already. And carbon emissions are a joke – a regulation joke in order to give the regulators something to regulate. It’s a fairy tale but a whole lot of people buy into it, I know.
Heck I can’t even FIND grade B maple syrup. There are very few places even listed online. Besides, I don’t think I could afford to use it as a sweetner even if I COULD find it.
Warmer winters, whatever the cause, have been threatening maple syrup production in Vermont for many years. I grew up in Vermont and heard this first-hand from the old men with sap buckets on their maple trees.
@D: I grew up in the cold north 55 yrs ago, and I have to laugh at the strong feelings on both sides re: global warming. It doesn’t really matter what you call it or what the reason is or isn’t…in northern Michigan SOMETHING is different. Snow of 8′ deep (and snow from Sept.-March) has now given way to winters where sometimes there is NO snow. All the fruit crops and maple syrup harvest that depend on cold “spring” temps ’til April are suffering severely. Many farmers have had to sell their family farms to golf developers & such. Maple syrup harvesting was a cultural tradition in many U.S. states. The older people like my dad who still downhill skis at 88 yrs old can’t believe the weather change!
Yes, something IS different, but it’s not global warming. The earth moves in *cycles*, always has and always will. Even during spells of significantly cold or hot weather, we can have a weird winter or three stuck in there. We’re actually moving into a cool cycle now. Usually the cycles last from 50 to 100 years, on average. Places like the Old Farmers Almanac have been recording this stuff for many years and even they don’t call it global warming or even climate change, because the climate changes on a daily basis.
I’m pushing 60 pretty soon and I grew up in the north central part of South Dakota. I’ve seen winters as bad as they come. So much snow we could build forts and tunnel from one to the other – and we did. We could also climb up the snow banks and get on top of the school and sled down. I’ve also seen winters, as a child of the 50’s and 60’s, where we were bottle feeding calves in the middle of February with just a sweater.
The earth is not static, so weather changes are really more common than not. I do believe, however, that our gov’t is tinkering with the weather and has been for about a century. It’s fun to look it up online because most people don’t even realize it goes on pretty regularly.
Global warming is absolute nonsense cooked up so that lots of people can make a lot of money! You are correct D. People need to do their own research, this has been dismissed and debunked over and over. Our planet is living and has a cycle/seasons; like some years we have lots of rain, so not so much, i.e. el nino and el nina, etc.
D,
Global Warming is a fact.
You are the one living in a fairy tale.
If global warming were a true issue and not a scam by the worlds wealthy to create a new money maker for themselves, we would be a minority at rectifying the problem with countries like China who produce more polutants than any other country in the world thumbing their noses at environmental anything!! This subject has very little if any merit when it comes to scientific proof although some will tell you they have the evidence………….or the “smokescreen for sheep”!
Yeah… No… There is a strong consensus in the scientific community that global warming is real. It’s the media organizations/those with agendas which are skewing the details/implications. Besides, even if somehow years of research, peer-reviewed studies, and utilization of the scientific method are wrong- what wrong would the planet get by trying to stop deforestation, stop pollution, and just better the place in general? This is what I have never understood about those vehemently against the idea of global warming. And who do you think are the real scammers- huge, almost unbreakable corporations (like oil companies), or passionate environmentalists and activists?
Coconut nectar has a downside of its own: sweetener at the expense of coconut oil. I would rather have the oil.
Ciao, Pavil