Grow Your Own Sweet Sorghum to Make Molasses

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PHOTO: FOTOLIA/LIGHTMOON
After the syrup has cooled for about an hour, it's ready to be funneled into final storage containers such as pint or quart glass jars. It should be a rich red or brown color, translucent, and not too thick. Any foam on top will melt back into the contents within a few days.

In past issues MOTHER EARTH NEWS has told you how to “grow yer own” honey and maple syrup. Now Mary Norwood would like to give you firsthand instructions in the flavorful southern art of producing yet a third homestead sugar substitute.

Is the high cost of maintaining a sweet tooth getting you down? Well, all over the South at this time of year, folks make a homegrown sugar substitute you might take kindly to: sweet sorghum molasses.

Molasses is an easy-to-process, healthful food — rich in iron, sulfur, and other minerals — which can replace sugar or honey in many recipes. Its flavor is quite different from that of store-bought molasses (a sugarmaking by-product which has a strong aftertaste). Sorghum sweetening is more delicate, with a Country-morning quality and just a hint of sweet earth.

If you’d like to boil your own sweetening next fall, why not think about putting in some sorghum come planting time? Although the crop is traditionally a southern specialty, it will grow anywhere corn flourishes . . . and only a quarter of an acre — plus a little patience — will supply your family with 10 to 15 gallons of good molasses.

Growing Sweet Sorghum

  • Published on Sep 1, 1975
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