Fun things to do with your friendly neighbourhood birch

Part II

Drink the sap. In the spring when the sap starts running again you can tap the trees and collect it. You can drink it 'as is' within a few days or ferment it to presrve it longer.

Pour the sap into 0.5 litre bottles, add to each bottle 2-3 slices of lemon, 5-6 raisins and 2 teaspoons of sugar. Put airtight caps on the bottles and take them to a cool storage. The drink will be ready for haymaking time*.

If you feel adventurous you can also make sparkling wine from birch sap.

Reduce 10 litres of sap to 5 litres. Put in each thoroughly cleaned shampagne bottle 3-4 washed raisins with big seeds and 10 centilitres suitable liqueur. Pour the reduced sap into the bottles so that the bottlenecks remain empty. Cork the bottles and fasten the corks with wire. Take the filled bottles to a cool cellar and pack them bottoms up into crates filled with sawdust. The wine will be ready after a couple of months.

* Haymaking time in Estonia is in the end of June, beginning of July.

The sap itself tastes like weak sugar water with something indefinable. I haven't tried the other recipes so I have no comment on their actual drinkability.