Re: Mo' on molasses

[Susan Evans Garlinghouse <suendavid@worldnet.att.net>]

K S Swigart wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 22 Jan 1998, Kim wrote:
> 
> > Sugar beet provides a lot of sugar to the US, and so the byproduct of
> > molasses you may be feeding your horse is probably from this source.
> > Unfortunately (which is probably why I'm unofficial), I  do not have any
> > hard numbers about the % of molasses from cane and from sugar beet. Just
> 
> According to the _Encyclopaedia Britanica_ (and information source that I
> consider to be eminently reliable)
> 
> "molasses, syrup remianinag after sugar is cristalized out of cane or beet
> juice...Cane molasses usually contains about 14 percent invert sugar, a
> mixture of glucose and fructose, compared with about 1 percent in beet
> molasses."
> 
> No that wasn't a typo, that's ONE percent in beet molasses.

Actually, different sources of molasses can contain widely varying
amounts of sugar.  Sugar beet molasses used for feeds CAN contain a very
high % of sugars, 35% isn't uncommon. Saying molasses contains X amount
of sugar is kinda like saying alfalfa always contains 16% protein.  It
varies.



> 
> Which leads to the very real question.  What is all the other stuff that
> is contained in molasses???  Everything else that is in the sugar
> cane/beet besides sugar (which has been processed out).  Presumably this
> is all the vitamins, minerals, etc. that the plant picked up from the soil
> while it was growing.

About 30% water (this also varies), about 6-7% protein, a trace amount
of fats, about 8-10% is in minerals, small amounts of mostly B vitamin
complexes.  The rest is, indeed, sugars.  Which don't always taste
sweet, by the way.  Feed molasses is quite high in sulfur, which tastes
nasty.

Susan Garlinghouse