Molasses

Molasses is the thick, dark, bittersweet syrup left behind when raw sugar is crystallised out of boiled cane or beet juice — the part the refinery cannot economically turn into white sugar, spun off in the centrifuge as a near-black liquid. Far from a waste product, it is a flavouring in its own right: deeply sweet but cut with a real bitterness and a savoury, smoky-mineral edge, carrying the iron, calcium and potassium that the white crystals leave behind. It comes in grades from light first-boiling molasses through dark to intense, faintly burnt blackstrap, and it is the backbone of gingerbread, baked beans, dark rum, brown sugar and barbecue glazes.