Cast Iron Cauldrons

On the maple syrup front things are going better than expected. I must confess that I was skeptical about boiling it in a cauldron. I know the old-timers did it but come on, it has to be so inefficient! Well, color me surprised! It boils down faster than I've ever seen sap boil. Aleks boiled off roughly 75 gallons of sap in one day (still woefully behind modern evaporators) and we had fresh syrup on homemade french toast with sausage for supper on Saturday. That's our tradition, to eat the first syrup at a special "thanksgiving" meal. Below is the sugar camp.
The sap storage barrel is on the left, the warming pan is just to the right of the cauldron. The corrugated metal is to keep sparks from flying around. The children spend all day up there (after school work is done) and come home to eat, bathe and fall into an exhausted sleep. It's a good, good life!