Thankfully there’s a reason for my fumble: ninety-one unique flavors are actually at work, according to the Canadian Department of Agriculture. They drew up a “flavor wheel” to categorize the complex differences of maple syrup, organized among thirteen families: vanilla, milky, empyreumatic (burned), floral, fruity, spicy, foreign (as in fermentation), foreign (as in something added), herbaceous, plant (forest, humus, or cereals), plant (ligneous, as in firewood or sawdust), maple, and finally confectionery.
