SC - bean vs. wheat

[melc2newton@juno.com]

Hi, Stefan and others!

Just a comment or two,  sugar not being my speci-ality and all. Now
crunchy frogs, OTOH,...

Stefan li Rous wrote:
> 
> Alys Katharine said:
> 
> >Someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding of modern
> >"brown sugar" is that some of the molasses-y stuff has been added back,
> >and therefore is not "period".  Period folk wanted the whitest sugar
> >possible, or that they could afford.  Raw sugar, turbinado sugar, might
> >be closer, depending on the original recipe.

Some things to bear in mind include the fact that the smaller the sugar
is ground, the whiter it gets, and also, that modern people often
underestimate what can be accomplished by a determined worker with a
mortar and pestle. In an era where the philosophical signs indicate that
the majority of people took great pride in seemingly insignificant work
(the best darn dung-gatherer in Shropshire!), and a world where, in some
places, fine bread flour was still ground by hand using tools very like
a mortar and pestle (what I like to call the between-two-rocks method),
a society where scullions were subject to...er...discipline when they
didn't produce, and finally, the existence of some mortars in a wide
range of job-specific designs and sizes that make the concept of
grinding fine powdered sugar a bit less unlikely.

Oh, another little snippet. Some sugar paste recipes call for the paste
to be kneaded and rolled out with some rice flour to keep it from
sticking to the marble, don't they? I have no idea about comparative
percentages, but the final product would contains some starch, just as
it would if using modern confectioners' sugar.    
> 
> Ok, raw sugar is closer than brown sugar. Is modern, stndard sugar
> or turbinado sugar closer to period sugar?

Depending on the recipe, I'd think about going with the turbinado (there
is another variety you sometimes see, called muscovado, I believe), or
possibly a mixture of turbinado and white. Some recipes do include a
process of clarifying the sugar to be used by cooking it as a syrup, and
then clarifying it with egg whites, like a consomme, before further
processing. In those types of recipes I'd skip the clarification process
and go with white.

Clarifying _stock_ with egg whites,  to make consomme, BTW, is a process
that appears to be comparatively modern, for those who were wondering...
.

Adamantius 
- -- 
______________________________________
Phil & Susan Troy
troy at asan.com
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