Classic Spruce Tip Syrup

I have to preface this by apologizing. I’m sorry for not getting this up sooner. I’ve been writing this website for years, and although I have a spruce tip syrup that tastes like spruce, it’s not the most powerful one you can make–it’s a hybrid, a shortcut. That older recipe of mine was back from when I had bartenders breathing down my neck about running out of spruce tip syrup for the bar, and, in 24 hours, it’s a pretty good approximation of the real thing, and handy in a pinch. But it’s still an approximation.

This is the real deal, the old fashioned, time honored traditional syrup that most people, especially those who have family from Eastern Europe will recognize. There’s two ingredients, well three actually: spruce tips, sugar, and time. Like I mentioned with my shortcut spruce syrup, you can get some good flavor from the tips overnight using my other recipe, but, the slow, steady maceration of the sugar and spruce tips, and the concentration of aromatic compounds that gets trapped in the jar (along with wild yeast–be sure to burp the jars occasionally) is really potent, in a delicious way. There’s icing on the cake too, in that there’s zero tannins. Zip. Zilch. Zero. If you’ve ever tasted a pine cone, or eaten something like the Georgian preserve varenye, you’ll know eating pine cones can be a resinous, mouth drying experience.

Oh, and the shelf life. The infusion with the sugar alone is strong enough that it will even hold at room temperature for months, without that much of a noticeable decrease in aroma. I prefer to refrigerate it to keep it bright and zippy, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t forgotten about a jar here and there, then opened them up to be pleasantly surprised after a few months.

The recipe itself, if it can even be called that, is easy enough that a child can make it (and it’s a great thing for kids to make to teach them about edible parts of conifers, along with supplying a dose of vitamin C to prevent scurvy). You take equal parts spruce tips and sugar–no weight measurements, no finicky scales, and mix them together, put them in a jar, let them sit in the sun for a couple months, then heat, strain, and voila–syrup that tastes like the soul of a spruce tree.

No white sugar

It might surprise you (as it did me) but the type of sugar is really important here. Originally I almost wrote this method off as a technique, since I’d put jars and jars up of spruce tips and sugar at the restaurant, only to be left with a syrup that was just ok. Over the years I’ve watched more than one chef make the exact same mistake. We assume that white sugar would be better, maybe cleaner somehow, but it isn’t.

The secret is all about harnessing aromas, moreso, giving aromas a place to go. Aromas like spruce are very water soluble. The magic happens when the natural moisture from the spruce tips seeps into the sugar, making a watery slurry which can absorb aromas better than a thick mat of sugar. Brown or organic sugar are what you want here for two reasons: 1, the color of the finished syrup is more attractive. 2. Brown sugar contains more moisture than white, and more moisture, means a more aromatic syrup. Makes sense, right?

How I use it

No rocket science here. This is a sweet syrup, perfect in place of maple syrup on pancakes or anywhere you’d use maple, but also good with other things with it’s sharp piney aroma. Here’s a few examples of how I’d it.

• With cheese. Soft cheese, especially goat cheese, loves the piney kick of spruce syrup, maple on the other hand, might be a little bland.
• Drizzled on crepes filled with berries and cream cheese (an old brunch dish I used to run worth revisiting).
• With thick yogurt. I often eat a bowl of granola and thick greek yogurt for breakfast, and drizzling on some spruce syrup, along with a handful of berries makes for a great meal.
• As a glaze for meats. Think ham, etc. A tablespoon per 1.5 lbs or so meat like fatty ground pork can make a nice breakfast sausage too.
• Lining flan molds. Sometimes I’ll add a drizzle of honey to the molds of a panna cotta or flan instead of caramel, and spruce syrup works just as good, it will turn into a natural sauce when the custard is unmolded.
• Beverage sweetener. Think lemonade, drinks, etc.
• Tossed with unsweetened, fresh fruit instead of sugar. Sometimes for dessert I might want just some fresh raspberries tossed with sugar and a dollop of whipped cream. Fresh berries tossed with spruce syrup will eventually give up some of their own juice and make a sort of natural sauce.

Not a 1:1 sugar substitute

Spruce tip syrup is some sweet stuff, and over the years I’ve seen a couple friends of mine make some very, very sweet desserts (by mistake) using it. While it might be tempting to say, flavor some ice cream with it, it can be difficult to get it right. Don’t use it as a 1:1 substitute for sugar as it’s more sweet. Mostly, think drizzle.

Another option: Vacuum sealed syrup

A jar with sugar and spruce tips is the old way, and it’s a good one, but for those of you who have vacuum sealers, know that you can do the same thing sealed in a bag. The benefit of this method is that there’s no glass and pressure to worry about as the mixture ferments, the drawback being that it can be a little more awkward to pour from, and some people eschew plastic.

The mixture below was a version with a number of different local herbs, including young pine cones, which are pretty popular in some groups. Before you go making your own franken-syrup though, I’d urge you to make the simple spruce syrup outlined in this post. I’ve made a lot of variations on conifer syrups, and other things, and the jist is anyone can take a bunch of random things, mix them in a jar and call it forest syrup, but, that doesn’t mean the end product will be something you like. Personally I like to keep the syrups pure, so I can taste the base ingredient. My advice is to keep it simple at first–less is more. There’s a reason the experimental syrup below doesn’t have a recipe to try that I like, yet.