Birch Sugar

birch sugar a sugar obtained by boiling down the sap of the sweet/black birch tree, Betula lenta, and other species in the genus.

Birch sugar is considerably less sweet than maple sugar (see maple syrup) and the sap from which it comes is not available until about a month after the maple sap is running. Medsger (1972) notes that the inner bark of the black birch has a sweet, spicy wintergreen flavour and was generally eaten by boys. He further notes:

It is claimed that in 1861, after the Battle of Carricks Ford, the edible bark of Black Birch probably saved the lives of hundreds of Garnett’s Confederate soldiers during their retreat over the mountains to Monterey, Virginia. For a number of years after that, the route the soldiers took could be traced by the peeled birch trees.