| Tootsall: « Reply #2 on: Oct 15th, 2003, 12:23pm
Question for you: Do you know what "refined" sugar is? Quite simply, it is "pure" sugar. That's all. The molecule in sucrose is nothing more sinister than C12H22O11. White sugar is made by taking coarse sugar that was produced in the cane fields and removing the dirt and syrups from the outside of the crystal. It is then melted down, purified to remove nitrates, etc. that the plant "took up" from the soil, and then recrystallized. Crystallization is, of course, one of the most perfect means of purification in existence since the formation of the crystal (sucrose, in this case) excludes impurities from the crystal and leaves them (the impurities) in the syrup which is then centrifuged and washed off before the crystals are dried and packaged.
"Brown" sugar, which is often preferred to the evil "refined" sugar is simply sugar that has been produced EXACTLY THE SAME WAY AS "REFINED" SUGAR that has then had some of the previously removed syrups PUT BACK ONTO THE OUTSIDE OF THE CRYSTALS!
That is right, my friends....Brown sugars (including "Golden", "Demararra", etc.) is "refined sugar" with the dirt put back onto the outside of the crystals. Reading from the "Beet Sugar Technology" text, brown sugar is defined as "A marketable product consisting of fine sugar crystals lightly coated with a yellow or brown-colored syrup that contains a relatively high percentage of invert sugar, which keeps the product slightly moist." It is the flavor of the impurities in the syrup that give the various brown and yellow sugars their unique flavours.
The above is based on my 17 years in a sugar factory.
For my money, I'd rather consume sugar as a sweetener than some artificial, man-made "chemical". It's sure a heck of a lot more "natural"! |