Rock Your Palate

Christopher Columbus first brought sugarcane to the West Indies in 1492. Sugarcane, in many forms was a trade item for the Early Colonists who used it in baking & brewing.
In Boston, Massachusetts on January 15, 1919 a very large storage tank holding millions of gallons of molasses busted open causing a sticky mass to blanket the entire city. This incident caused millions in damages, injured and killed a number of people. And was forever remembered as ‘The Great Molasses Flood of 1919’.

Molasses is basically non-crystallized sucrose or sugar. It is either designated as sulfured or unsulfured. Sulfur dioxide gas is used as a preservative and bleaching agent in the sulfured molasses product. The sulfur may also give the molasses an unpleasant odor and cause an allergic reaction in some people. Unsulfured molasses tends to be lighter and have a cleaner sugarcane flavor than sulfured. Most brands of molasses will indicate whether they are sulfured or not.

Growing up, my kids favorite dessert containing molasses was Indian Pudding. Served in a stemmed large red wine glass topped with whipped cream, vanilla ice cream or both.