I'm just starting to experiment with home brew beer now, this is our first deviation from the kits, so I figured something simple would be appropriate.

We still used the hops and yeast from a 'Real Ale' kit, but instead of the recommended 1kg sugar, we used 600g of sugar and 600g (450ml) of maple syrup. According to the nutritional information sticker on the syrup, it is 2/3 sugars by weight, so that should be the equivalent of 1kg in total.
I'm not sure if this is the best way to work out what mixture to use, maybe someone can point me in the direction of a better method for choosing proportions of my ingredients, but I guess this time we'll just have to wait and see. Its been fermenting for about a week now, and still shows no signs of slowing down.

Also, I've considered bottling some for my father. He likes trying different beers, and collects the bottles, so I figured a few bottles of something home-made would be a good christmas present. However, in the shop I can only find screw-top bottles, which wouldn't look so good in his collection. Is there somewhere I can obtain bottles similar to his others, or does applying the metal tops require specialised equipment?

Edit: (This is probably in the wrong forum now, I think. I started out intending to post as a short recipie, but ended up feeling insecure about how it would turn out and asking questions)    

Well, everything seems to be going well as far as I can tell.

Last Friday morning, the hydrometer reading was steady at 1.008, stayed there for a couple of days, so on Saturday night we moved it to a pressure barrel with another 150g of sugar. Giving in to temptation, I tried a small sample on Saturday, after a full week pressured. The beer is good, quite a nutty flavor, but the pressure seems very high. A reading from the sample is up again, now at 1.014, I'm not quite sure what that means.

We've got the barrel in the shed now, cooling down. I'm hoping that by this time next week, the yeast should have settled enough and it will be ready to drink for the xmas party. Ever hopeful...

good luck. i expermented with maple sugar and wheat attempting to brew a solid maple wheat beer. i have yet profected the exact amount of maple syrup. i constantly wind up with what i refer to as breakfeast beer, wheat from pancakes and maple syrup - seemed to make some sense. so what seems to be correct by math forumulas hasnt exactly worked out for me.