The Daily Ingredient: Molasses

After exploring the world of brown sugar yesterday I felt it only right to dive into what gives sugar it’s brown; molasses. This biproduct of turning sugar cane into sugar has a rich history in America, and makes great chewy Christmas cookies. It ads great savory flavor to dishes like beans, and it even used to treat burns and wounds in some countries.

The History of Molasses
Since the discovery of sugar, molasses has been its cousin in crime, sweetening many types of foods. In the beginning it was primarily used in the making of Rum. It was cheaper than refined sugar and was used as the primary sweetener by many.

By 1920 refined white sugar had gone down in price and took over as the dominate sweetener. In 1919 a large Molasses storage tank in Boston collapsed filling the streets with the sticky syrup and killing 21 people. (learn more here>>)

Molasses Today
Today molasses costs nearly twice as much as white sugar, but is still used widely. It is used to make rum and other alcohols, as well curing plants such as tobacco. It is added to cattle feed to provide carbohydrates and other nutrition. Blackstrap molasses is even sold as a nutritional supplement in health stores.

Plus it is a popular ingredient in many modern recipes.

Cooking with Molasses
Molasses is a wildly useful ingredient. It can be used to make cookies chewy, or to make salt meat dishes more savory.

Molasses can be used in many different type of recipes including cookies, sweet potatoes , baked beans, or even turkey glaze .

Substitutions: You can substitute normal sugar for molasses but it won’t have as strong of flavor, so you may want to up what ever spice you are using to compensate. You can also use brown sugar and still get some of that flavor since brown sugar has a little molasses in it. ¾ cup sugar mix with ¼ water should do the trick for every 1 cup molasses. When using brown sugar you can use a little less water. DO NOT substitute blackstrap molasses for normal molasses because the flavor is MUCH stronger.

Storage: Molasses usually comes in a glass jar. It doesn’t require refrigeration, and since it is so thick it is hard to move, you your best bet is just to store it in the container you bought it in.

So now that you know your thick syrup sugar friend, lets get cooking!