How to make birch sap
Birch sap is undoubtedly a valuable liquid useful for our entire body. It contains many vitamins and nutrients. In addition, this product has a pleasant aroma and sweet taste. In order to always have a delicious drink in the house, you need to know how to prepare birch sap for the future for a whole year.
When and how to get birch sap
In the period of snow melting, when young leaves have not yet blossomed on the trees, the time begins, which is called "crying birches". Typically this season falls in mid-March - April. It is then that you need to go to collect the valuable liquid with a sweet taste.
Collect birch sap only in clean forests, far from the road and cities, otherwise the liquid may not be beneficial, but harm to health.
Collecting birch sap is a seemingly simple matter, but it has several rules:
- The birch should be neither young nor old.
- From one tree, you can collect no more than 1 liter of juice in 2-3 days.
- The incision is made small, so as not to harm the birch.
- After the procedure, it is necessary to seal the cut with plasticine, wax, garden varnish.
In order to collect the juice, you need to make a small cut in the tree bark (at a distance of 25-30 cm from the ground) and clean it. Insert a groove made of metal or plastic into the hole, through which the liquid will flow. Install a jar, plastic or glass bottle, in general, any convenient container from below. It is important to carefully monitor the flowing juice, and after filling the jar, close up the cut in the trunk with wax, garden pitch.
It should be noted that in sunny weather the birch “cries” faster than in cloudy weather.
Beneficial features
Birch sap, and especially collected in places remote from people and roads, has many useful properties. Doctors recommend consuming at least one glass of valuable liquid a day in the spring. It helps to cope with spring weakness, depression, distraction and fatigue.
"Tears of a Birch" can also boast of the ability to heal diseases of the stomach and liver, relieve headaches and charitably influence the state of the body as a whole. In addition, cosmetologists assure that washing with birch sap has a positive effect on the appearance of the skin, fights age spots and acne. To do this, you need not only to use the elixir, but also to wash your face with it.
Making birch sap
Making birch sap at home is not difficult and even interesting. Most often, the magic sweet liquid is preserved, but many also freeze "birch tears". Thanks to the second method of storing birch sap, it does not lose its useful properties, as it happens during heat treatment, but we will consider both methods of harvesting.
Canning
The first recipe for making birch sap is based on heat treatment. Unfortunately, with this method of preparing a tasty liquid, all vitamins and nutrients are lost, but the drink continues to be tasty.
To make birch sap at home, we need:
- 7 liters of birch sap;
- 1 lemon;
- 1 orange;
- a sprig of dry mint (added to taste, but with this ingredient, the drink will eventually acquire a more interesting aroma);
- 1 cup granulated sugar.
Pour juice into a large saucepan, add sugar. We put the drink on medium heat. As soon as the liquid begins to boil, collect all the foam from the juice with a spoon and remove it. If this is not done, a sediment will form in the rolled up can with a delicious drink. After boiling, add half a lemon, half an orange (it is better to cut lemon and orange into circles) and a dry twig mint, after which we reduce the heat to a minimum and leave for 10-12 minutes.
Before preparing the coveted juice, it is worth sterilizing the cans. It is important to do this especially carefully so that the drink does not spoil. We wash the jar with a clean sponge under hot water with soda, then sterilize the glass containers in any way convenient for you. Bottles, if you decide to store birch sap in them, just rinse with hot water and soda.
As soon as the appointed time has come, the "birch tears" are prepared, we carefully filter them.
Put the remaining half of the lemon and orange at the bottom of the prepared jars (cut them into circles). Pour homemade birch sap into a container, roll it up with a metal lid and set it upside down in a cold place.
If you store juice in bottles, then you can prepare lemon and orange for subsequent placement on the bottom of the dish using cubes, sticks or any other method of medium-sized cutting.
Freezing
Another way to prepare and store birch sap is to freeze it. It is simple and practical. Thus, the drink will not lose valuable substances and vitamins useful for the body.
For this method, you only need birch sap in its pure form and bags, or plastic bottles.
Fresh birch sap is poured into bottles and tightly sealed, placed in the freezer.
If you are using packages, they must be clean, new. It is better to pour the liquid into them in small portions, 2 glasses of drink in a bag. Be sure to release all the air, close the bag tightly and send it to the freezer.
"How to make birch sap at home?" - at all times this issue has been relevant. There are a huge number of ways and recipes for creating a delicious drink now, and all of them are unique and interesting in their own way. Of course, it would be great to try birch sap in all versions, but it's worth starting with a simple and at the same time delicious recipe.
Use Birch juice useful and pleasant, because the drink is not only rich in substances valuable for health, but also has a thirst-quenching effect and excellent taste.