From Cooking Wiki
Facts about sugar
Sugars are useful in cooking:
(1) because of their flavor, or the effect they have in modifying or intensifying other flavors;
(2) because of their texture, or the changes they make in the texture of other foods;
(3) because they help in preserving other foods, especially fruits.
Use of Sugar in Flavoring Foods
SUGARS NOT EQUALLY SWEET
Maple sugar, brown sugar and molasses, weight for weight with white sugar, are a little less sweet than white sugar. Corn syrup or glucose, weight for weight with white sugar, is only about three-fifths as sweet as white sugar and may be used to reduce the sweetness of white sugar. Many persons prefer this modified sweetness.
FOODS TASTE SWEETER HOT THAN COLD
This accounts for differences in the amounts of sugar used in making frozen desserts and other desserts.
SOME SUGARS CONTAIN SPECIAL FLAVORS, for example: maple sugar, brown sugar, molasses, honey.
SUGAR BRINGS OUT OR MODIFIES NATURAL FLAVORS
It makes bitter chocolate and fruit acids more mellow and agreeable in flavor. It brings out flavor in bland foods like cereals, breads, milk and some mild-flavored vegetables.
In Which Sugar Affects Texture of Foods
IN CAKES, used in right proportions, sugar helps to make them tender and light. Too much sugar makes cake tough and heavy.
IN BREADS, used in right proportions sugar helps to make them light. Too much sugar makes bread coarse in texture.
WITH FRUIT JUICES, used in right proportions, makes fruit- juice jelly. Too much sugar makes jelly "wine off" and makes it soft and sticky in texture. Too little sugar necessitates over- cooking, impairs flavor and gives a tough texture.
IN BEATEN EGG WHITE, sugar helps the egg to hold air and remain stiff. Too much sugar makes the egg white flatten out and settle.
Approximate Amounts of Sugar for Various Common Dishes
ICE CREAMS 2 to 4 tablespoons to 1 cup mixture.
CUSTARDS (not frozen) 1 to 2 tablespoons to 1 cup milk.
CAKES One-half as much sugar as flour. In chocolate cakes, three-
quarters as much sugar as flour. MERINGUES 1 to 5 tablespoons to 1 egg white. FROSTINGS 1 to 3 cups to 1 egg white. BREADS 1 tablespoon or less to 1 cup flour, if any is used. MUFFINS 2 tablespoons or less to 1 cup flour, if any is used.
Sugar Types
Sugar is composed of oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon. There are three kinds, cane sugar, or sucrose; grape sugar, or glu cose; inilk sugar, or lactose.
Cane sugar as an article of food closely resembles starch, but it is soluble and therefore more easily digested. It is readily distinguished by its sweet taste. It is found in many animal juices and also in fruits, but exists mainly in vegetable juices which have little or no acid in their sap, like sugar cane, rock maple, and beet-root. In its natural state it is dissolved in the vegetable fluids, mingled with many other substances. It is obtained by crushing the raw material ; the fluids thus obtained are heated with a solution of lime, which causes the impurities to separate and rise in scum. These are removed, and the purified juice boiled down until it solidifies as a brownish de posit. This brown sugar is again dissolved, boiled, and filtered through charcoal, evaporated, and crystallized. Molasses is the drainage of the raw sugar. Brown sugar is the first product.
Granulated sugar is brown sugar refined and re-crystallized.
All brown and moist sugars are inferior in quality; they contain water and mineral matter, and are sometimes infested by a minute insect. Loaf sugar is the purest.
Sucrose, or cane sugar, is changed, by the acids of the gastric juice and the nitrogenous matter of the food, into grape sugar, or glucose. One of the most remarkable properties of sugar is that it can be decomposed and converted into other substances by fermentation. In its chemical relations sugar ranks with acids, and combines with bases, as in sugar of lead. It melts at 320, and by cooling forms a transparent amber-colored solid known as barley sugar. If heated to 420, it forms a brown mass, called caramel. Sugar has great preservative powers, and is used in preserving fruits, hams, bacon, etc. Glucose, or grape sugar, is abundantly distributed throughout the vegetable kingdom. It is found in honey, figs, grapes, and other fruits which have acid juices. It is less sweet than cane sugar, and is immediately absorbed into the circulation when taken into the stomach/ It is less soluble and less easily crystallized than sucrose.
Lactose, or milk sugar, is obtained only from the milk of mam malia. It has the composition of cane sugar, and is converted into grape sugar when taken as food.
