Maple extract is one of a group of concentrated flavorings used in food preparation. As with essences, liquid extracts like maple extract can be kept indefinitely when stored in an airtight container in a cool dark place. This is why extracts are often sold in very dark brown bottles.

Maple extract may have four different labels. It may be pure, natural, imitation, or artificial. Artificial and imitation maple extract may not have any maple product in them at all. Also note that maple extract, like other liquid extracts, does have an alcohol base.

Maple extract, as with all extracts, and essences as well, is used to add flavor without adding significant volume or altering the consistency. So maple extract can provide maple flavor as a substitute for adding a larger amount of maple syrup, maple sugar, maple honey, maple cream or butter, or maple-flavored syrup, a substitute that is usually made primarily of corn syrup.

Maple extract is called for in recipes such as glazes, frostings, and icings, and for making maple ice cream, all cases in which the significantly greater amounts of other maple products that would be required would deleteriously affect the texture and consistency of the product. Maple extract can also be substituted for vanilla extract in recipes such as cookie doughs and fillings.

Outside the kitchen, one can find maple extract used as fragrance component in beauty products, often combined with almond. It appears, for example, in some versions of exfoliating body polish, complexion masks, facial astringent, face and body cleanser, toner to clean and tighten pores, lip plumping products, and micro-mini peel systems, as well as hair conditioners. Look for the words “Acer Saccharinum (Sugar Maple) Extract.”

A 2002 study found that Acer Saccharinum extracts are potentially dangerous to horses, but they have access to it most usually from eating maple leaves. No other toxicity studies are available.