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Does anyone know about sorghum syrup?

7 years ago

When I was a kid we used to have sorghum syrup and I really loved it. It was a beautiful dark golden color and had a slightly different flavor from any other syrup. Very good on biscuits. I've searched it in all the local stores and can't find it. I see that it is available online but would rather buy it locally. Anyone ever eaten it and/or know where to get it? I see that online it's also referred to as sorghum molasses.

Comments (40)

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    I love the stuff and I can get it at a local farmer's market for half what I can buy it on line for. When Elery and I go to Tennessee we'll pick up a jar or two, it's more common there than it is here in Michigan, but usually I buy it on line, farmer's markets close here for the winter.

    Elery likes it mixed 50/50 with butter, to spread on biscuits. I just like it.

    Annie

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    My first experience with sorghum syrup was while traveling in North Carolina many, many years ago. Bought it and boiled peanuts to try at a roadside stand. Fell deeply in love with the sorghum but hated the peanuts. Finding sorghum here in the 'north' just doesn't happen much. I have seen it at Cracker Barrel restaurants, and sometimes at Amish specialty stores. The syrup here in the north just doesn't measure up to the fresh made we got at the farmers stand that fall in N.C.

  • 7 years ago

    Do you have a Walmart near you? They probably have it. I've never had it, but now my curiosity is up, so I'll be looking for it the next time I go there.

    Rusty

  • 7 years ago

    Rusty we don't have it in the Walmart here, neither in the major chain grocery, Publix or in any of the other smaller ones, believe me, I've looked.

  • 7 years ago

    I remember when you could find it in the grocery stores here too - most likely Winn Dixie. I miss it. Awesome with cornbread!

    I think it went out of large scale commercial production, but you can find some from small producers online, I believe. The prices were rather extravagant the last time I checked.

    Just did a quick search and Amazon has it.

  • 7 years ago

    Walmart does offer it online, if not in local stores.

  • 7 years ago

    You said you wanted to buy it locally - where do you live Rita?

    All forms of sorghum are commonly available here in north Missouri, especially in Amish and Mennonite stores.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    I know you can get it (or at least you used to be able to) from the Honey Hut at the Daytona flea market. There are a lot of pioneer villages that sell it once they make it, in the fall, I think.

    ETA Honey Hut sells Golden Barrel sorghum, so the same kind you can order from several places online.

    You're over on the west coast, aren't you? There are a lot of Mennonites around the Sarasota/Bradenton area.

  • 7 years ago

    I've never had sorghum syrup, but I love popped sorghum.

  • 7 years ago

    If you do a search of the forum, you'll find what Grainlady had to say about sorghum syrup. She worked for the sorghum people and developed baking recipes with sorghum flour, and also talked to us about the syrup. That's all I know on the subject. :) Never seen it myself.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    I have to admit I don't care for it much. Don't like that odd tang it has, but I can see why people who like it like it a lot. But then I've only had it right out of the kettle when people were demonstrating how it used to be made.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    Glenda, I was about to write about the sorghum mill that was up the mountain from where I grew up, and there it is! Yes, I am very familiar with that as we had it all the time. It was still operating until probably 15-20 years ago iirc. Maybe longer. We used to stop and buy some in the way to my grandmother’s or my mother would get it for me. My mother is been gone a little over 20 years now. I know some people who have relatives in the area, will have to find out if they still grow and process the cane.

    For those who have never had it, it does taste stronger than molasses. But mixed with butter on a fresh warm biscuit, it’s wonderful.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    Outside Playing. My dad had to have his yearly fix on Sand Mountain Sorghum. I developed a taste for it as well. Nothing like warm biscuit with sorghum and butter.

    Where did you live growing up? I'm from Gadsden.

  • 7 years ago

    I've never heard of sorghum or sorghum syrup. I looked it up and know a bit more. The material I found suggested sorghum seems to be one of those things popular in one region (the South) and not so much in others.

  • PRO
    7 years ago

    I grew up with sorghum but we called it "molasses", not syrup. My father loved the stuff on pancakes etc.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    Oh yeah it was a regular on the table

    I have not had any in years. But it is readily available in this area. There were fields of it all around the Dallas area. Right near our house. It's very pretty in full head ready for harvest.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    Glenda, I grew up in Guntersville. Still have property there. I had relatives in Gadsden at the time. My Mother was born in Attalla and graduated from EHS.

    Elmer, yes the cane sorghum syrup is made from is primarily grown in the south, and pretty much only in the south as far as I know because of climate. The milder and sweeter syrups like maple are much more popular and more widely known.

  • 7 years ago

    Hmm interesting posts! I can buy sorghum molasses at the local grocery stores.

  • 7 years ago

    Oddly enough, there's a fair amount of sorghum grown down in the sugar country in FL. A few years ago I had to go to Devil's Garden, way out in the middle of nowhere, and as I bumped along the dirt road I was very surprised to see that the cane fields gave way to sorghum about two miles past the sugar refinery.

  • 7 years ago

    I have some in my fridge. I love it in gingerbread and on pancakes or French toast. It was bought in the area.

    Sue in central Indiana

  • 7 years ago

    I have a cup of hot lemon water to which I add 1 Tbs. of molasses every morning.

  • 7 years ago

    Reading this makes my mouth water.

    anyone try cane syrup?

  • PRO
    7 years ago

    Yes, wonderful in gingerbread!

  • 7 years ago

    Years ago I saw sorghum harvested and made at a neighbor's farm. Old timers referred to it as "those molasses."

  • 7 years ago

    It is an oddity that molasses is plural.

    There was a Park that planted a big sorghum field to do a big molasses cook as a living history thing but the person who bought the seed didn't know there were several types of sorghum and bought a feed grade normally used for silage. The syrup was an astonishing color of vivid green and very bitter. Very funny and a great embarrassment to the staff.

  • 7 years ago

    Ritaweeda, I know exactly what you're talking about. What you want is 'Brer Rabbit Syrup'. BR is a blend of molasses and corn syrup. (Probably easy to make your own.)


    Reason that I know this is because I went to visit my cousins for a week or so when I was 8-9 years old. My aunt made pancakes for breakfast and had the Brer Rabbit syrup. (We always had maple syrup at home.) So, expecting maple flavor, I had a rude shock when the syrup tasted like molasses!


    That was many moons ago but Brer Rabbit is still around. Depending on where you live, might be impossible or next to, to find. Amazon has it, though.

  • 7 years ago

    Cilantro, I've seen the stuff you are talking about (in fact I have some for baked beans, baking, etc.) and this isn't what we were eating. The stuff we had back then was a golden color, like honey. It didn't have the same strong taste as molasses at all. I've looked online for a place around here that might have it and there isn't any. So if I really want some I'll have to order online.

  • 7 years ago

    To add---

    If you're having trouble finding molasses/ sorghum (which I did after moving from OK to WI)...

    I've found that Aldi stocks it in the baking section but only as a seasonal item (fall/ winter). Other outlets to check are Wal-Mart and Save-A-Lot. Both WMT and SAL have southern roots and those are the places that I have the best luck finding 'southern type' foods. I've also found it sometimes at salvage type grocery stores. I like to haunt those for stuff that I can't find locally. Never know what will turn up in them because they end up with stuff from all over. Just have to really watch the 'use by' dates. With some items (like molasses) the use-by date doesn't really matter.


    I learned a tip from dcarch about making your own brown sugar. Brown sugar is just sugar & molasses. When I need brown sugar for baking, I just substitute white sugar with a dollop of molasses, using a bit less white sugar. Saves the messy business of having to pack brown sugar into a measuring cup. I still keep brown sugar for the convenience factor for things like upside down cake, etc, so I don't have to mess up the food processor to combine sugar and syrup. Since he posted that tip, I buy a whole lot less brown sugar than I used to.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    I've found that Aldi stocks it in the baking section but only as a seasonal item

    What molasses do you mean? I've seen regular molasses in Aldi, but never, ever sorghum molasses. Ditto walmart. Maybe that's a regional thing, too?

    Ritaweeda, I know what you mean. Golden Barrel still makes a golden sorghum syrup, but it's confusing because they also make a syrup with corn syrup, a few other things, and no sorghum, which is the one our publix carries.

  • 7 years ago

    The Aldi stuff is 'unsulphured molasses'. I just finished a qt. of Golden Barrel molasses but don't remember (for sure) where I bought it, probably from the salvage grocery in Marshfield. Tossed the container and it's history as of Tuesday when the trash was picked up but I'm pretty sure it was called 'Baking Molasses'.


    Not a connoisseur of the stuff so I buy a jug when I can find it to use as an ingredient. I know that I've eaten 'sorghum' when I was a kid...on biscuits. Mom would buy it at roadside stands when we lived in SE OK; packaged in paint can like tins. I also remember seeing the tins at a stand when I lived in N Central OK. I suspect it was locally/ regionally produced.


    I'm sure it is a regional thing; I know that I had trouble finding just 'molasses' when I moved to WI. Guess that I'm lucky for not having developed a discerning palate for the differences between the two.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    But most molasses is made from sugar (cane or beet), not sorghum. It's basically what's left over after you refine the sugar crystals out.

    So I still don't understand--they carry sorghum molasses in your Aldi? I always buy unsulfured molasses but it's not made from sorghum.

  • 7 years ago

    I am sure you can get it at Cracker Barrel, or side of the road stands & farmers market

  • 7 years ago

    No, writersblock, I said the Aldi stuff was 'unsulfured molasses'. That's the exact term on the label, assumption being that it is derived from cane.

  • 7 years ago
    last modified: 7 years ago

    I checked the label on mine, it doesn't say "syrup" OR "molasses" It says "Real Kentucky Sorghum" and it's from Oberholtzer's Sorghum Mill, Liberty, Kentucky. The jar looks just like this one: https://heatherhillfarms.com/product/oberholtzers-sorghum/

    I paid $4.99 for it, according to the sticker on the lid of the jar, but I think we picked it up on a trip to visit his family in Tennessee If you look around the internet, you may be able to find it more cheaply than the link I attached.

    This brand is also available at Amazon in a 42 ounce jar for $21.99 and free shipping if you have prime, but that's kind of pricey, IMO...

    Annie


  • 7 years ago

    Occasionally, sorghum is grown in southern Illinois mostly as a specialty. I knew one person who grew sorghum to make molasses and he did not make much profit per acre. He did it to supply himself and a few friends.

  • 7 years ago

    We grow sorghum in Iowa....use it for cattle feed but it's not very economical as a feed crop.
    I live about 10 miles from this place....never tasted another brand....this is always in my cupboard.
    http://www.maasdamsorghum.com/

  • 7 years ago

    Thanks for the clarification, ci_lantro.