Thanks, Kyle! 

We always used molasses at home growing up - on pancakes, french toast, bread. Molasses cookies are great, too - sort  of like gingerbread. Also popular on the East Coast poured on baked ham and on salt cod (fish) cooked with pork rashers (bacon grease with bits of bacon left behind - see the South doesn't have the monopoly on artery clogging recipes, lol). My husband is from here in central Canada. He can't stand the stuff. Guess you have to grow up with it. :-)

Of course the reason molasses is so popular on the east coast is that it came up with the rum from the Carribean. In Newfoundland they have a wicked rum called Screech. Interestingly enough the name screech is credited to an American:

http://www.climate.uvic.ca/people/afanning/NFLD/screech.html

Hey we could probably do a Regional Cooking Primer with all the background trivia. ;-)

Yvonne

>>> [log in to unmask] 06/18/02 11:05AM >>>
Depends.  Molasses is usually made from cane, but can also be made from
sorghum ("blackstrap molasses" is the byproduct of cane sugar processing
after most of the sucrose has been removed--it's pretty awful stuff).  There
are all sorts of molasses: from light sweet down to blackstrap.  It's
probably better for you than white sugar if you are looking for a sweetener.
It also does not have the problems of honey, which can cause health isuues
for babies.

Cane cannot grow in the north at all, but sorghum can be planted in many
northern states, though it's not native.  It's a wonderful feed for
songbirds, rabbits and pheasant.  The plant itself looks a bit like corn
(maize) when it's not mature.  In the fall, after the sugars have receded it
kinda looks like a tall (6-8 feet) weed, with a big seedy cone on top.  It
grows from seed, and today is harvested mainly for seed.  The neat thing
about sorghum is that it has no gluten, so it can be used in a variety of
food products for people who are gluten sensitive (celiac-sprue sufferers,
fr'instance--geez, do I sound like an agricultural extension agent, or
what?).  BTW, the Chinese have made a sorghum wine for centuries.

When I was a kid, after my dad got out of the USMC, we had a little acreage
and he would plant a corn, beans sorghum mix just for the wildlife.  All the
neighbors had torn up their fencerows and there was no winter cover left, so
Dad would do his little part for the fur and feathers gang.

I'm sure this is more than you EVER wanted to know about sorghum, but I love
useless trivia.

-Kyle