Cassell's dictionary of cookery

1. Brown, or Muscovado Sugar. — The plants or canes being crushed in a mill, the juice having passed through a strainer is collected in the clarifier, where it is first exposed to the action of a gentle fire, after being " tempered" (mixed with alkali) for the purpose of facilitating the separation of the liquor from its impurities. It is then conveyed into the large evaporating copper, and successively into two others, each of smaller size, the superintending boiler freeing it, during the process, from the scum and feculent matters which rise to the surface. The syrup then reaches the last copper vessel, called the " striking tache," where it is boiled till sufiiciently concentrated to be capable of granulating in the cooler, whence it is transferred with the least possible delay to prevent charring. Here it soon ceases to be a liquid, and when fully crystallised is put into hogsheads (called "potting") placed on their ends in the curing-house, with several apertures in their bottoms, through which the molasses drain into a cistern below. In this state they remain till properly cured, when the casks are filled up and prepared for shipment. 2. Clayed Sugar is prepaied by taking the juice, as in the case of muscovado sugar, when boiled to a proper consistency, and pouring it into conical pots with the apex downwards. These pots have a hole at the lower extremity, through which the molasses or syrup is allowed to drain. After this draining has continued for some time a stratum of moistened clay is spread over the surface of the pots, the moisture of which, percolating through the mass, is found to contribute powerfully to its purification. 3. Refined Sugar may be prepared from muscovado or clayed sugar by re-dissolving the sugar in water, and after boiling it with some purifying substance, pouring it as before into conical pots, which are again covered with moistened clay. A repetition of this process produces double-refined sugar ; but a variety of improved processes are now resorted to. 4. Sugar Candy. — Solutions of brown or clayed sugar boiled until they become thick, and then removed into a hot room, formed upon sticks or strings put into the vessels for that purpose into crystals or candy. — MacCuUoch. Sugar Vinegar. — Put eight pounds of the coarsest and cheapest moist sugar into five gallons of water. Stir the liquor well, boil it, skimming carefully till the scum ceases to rise. Pour it into a cask, and when it is lukewarm put into it a thick piece of toast well covered with fresh yeast. Leave it open for four or five days, then paste a piece of paper over the bung-hole, and prick it in three or four places with a pin. Keep it in a warm dry place till it is ready, then draw it off, and bottle it. Before bottling it, boil it a quarter of a minute, as this will keep it from becoming thick and cloudy. The vessels containing the vinegar should not be quite filled, nor should the vinegar be kept entirely from the air. If SUG ( 942 ) SUM this vinegar is made in March or April, it ^^■ill be ready for bottling in September. Sugar Vinegar (another way) . — To every gallon of water add two pounds of brown sugar and little yeast. Have it exposed to the sun for six months in a vessel slightly stopped.