SC - Russian Black Bread

[david friedman]

At 1:53 AM -0400 9/4/99, LrdRas at aol.com wrote:
>In a message dated 9/4/99 1:45:38 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
>roecourt at mindspring.com writes:
>
><<  I think the Molasses may be period, >>
>
>Nope. OOP.

C. Anne Wilson discusses the relevant history in her book on food in
England. Molasses is a waste product from the production of sugar. When
sugar was an expensive item imported from abroad, molasses were essentially
nonexistent in England. As the West Indian sugar plantations went into
production, and sugar refining started in England, molasses became
increasingly available, first as an expensive ingredient for medical
purposes and then, as quantity increased, as a cheap ingredient for
cooking. She isn't precise about when the transition occurs, but it seems
to be near or shortly after the end of our period.

Presumably, molasses would have been available much earlier in the places
that sugar was coming from earlier. But my guess is that they would not
have been available in Russia until after our period.

David/Cariadoc
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/


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