How white sugar is made. Where is sugar extracted from in the world?

The content of the article

SUGAR, from a chemical point of view, any substance from a large group of water-soluble carbohydrates, usually with a low molecular weight and a more or less pronounced sweet taste. These are mainly monosaccharides ( simple sugars) and disaccharides, the molecule of which consists of two monosaccharide residues. The former include glucose (sometimes called dextrose or grape sugar) and fructose ( fruit sugar, levulose); to the second - lactose (milk sugar), maltose (malt sugar) and sucrose (cane or beet sugar). In everyday life, however, only the usual food sweetener, sucrose, is called sugar; it is she who will be considered in this article.

Sugar (sucrose) is a sweet crystalline substance derived mainly from juice sugar cane or sugar beets. In its pure (refined) form, sugar is white, and its crystals are colorless. The brownish color of many of its varieties is due to the admixture of various amounts of molasses - condensed vegetable juice that envelops the crystals.

Sugar is a high-calorie food; his energy value- OK. 400 kcal per 100 g. It is easily digested and easily absorbed by the body, i.е. it is a fairly concentrated and quickly mobilized source of energy.

Application.

Sugar is an important ingredient various dishes, drinks, bakery and confectionery products. It is added to tea, coffee, cocoa; it is the main component of sweets, icings, creams and ice creams. Sugar is used in meat preservation, leather dressing and in the tobacco industry. It serves as a preservative in jams, jellies and other fruit products.

Sugar is also important for the chemical industry. Thousands of derivatives are obtained from it, used in a wide variety of fields, including the production of plastics, pharmaceuticals, fizzy drinks and frozen foods.

Sources.

Several hundred different sugars are known in nature. Each green plant forms certain substances belonging to this group. During photosynthesis from carbon dioxide atmosphere and water obtained mainly from the soil, under the influence of solar energy, glucose is first formed, and then it is converted into other sugars.

In different parts of the world, in addition to cane and beet sugar, some other products are used as sweeteners, such as corn syrup, maple syrup, honey, sorghum, palm and malt sugar. Corn syrup is a very viscous, almost colorless liquid obtained directly from cornstarch. The Aztecs, who used this sweet syrup, made it from corn in much the same way that sugar is made from cane today. Molasses is much inferior to refined sugar in terms of sweetness, however, it makes it possible to regulate the crystallization process in the manufacture of sweets and is much cheaper than sugar, therefore it is widely used in confectionery business. Honey, which is high in fructose and glucose, is more expensive than sugar, and is added to some foods only when you want to give them a special taste. The same is the case with maple syrup, which is valued primarily for its specific flavor.

Sugar syrup is obtained from the stalks of bread sorghum, which has been used in China since ancient times. Sugar from it, however, has never been refined so well that it could successfully compete with beet or cane. India is practically the only country where palm sugar is commercially produced, but this country produces much more cane sugar. In Japan, malt sugar, made from starchy rice or millet, has been used as a sweetener for over 2,000 years. This substance (maltose) can also be obtained with the help of yeast from ordinary starch. It is much inferior to sucrose in sweetness, but is used in the manufacture bakery products and various types of baby food.

Prehistoric man satisfied his need for sugar through honey and fruits. Some flowers probably served the same purpose, the nectar of which contains a small amount of sucrose. In India, more than 4,000 years ago, a kind of raw sugar was mined from the flowers of the maduka tree ( Madhuca). Africans in the Cape Colony used the view Melianthus major, and the Boers in South Africa - Protea cynaroides. In the Bible, honey is mentioned quite often, and “sweet cane” is mentioned only twice, from which we can conclude that it was honey that served as the main sweetener in biblical times; this, by the way, is also confirmed by historical evidence, according to which sugar cane began to be grown in the Middle East in the first centuries of our era.

For a not too sophisticated taste, refined cane and beet sugar are almost indistinguishable. Raw sugar, an intermediate product of production containing an admixture of vegetable juice, is another matter. Here the difference is very noticeable: raw cane sugar is quite suitable for consumption (if, of course, obtained in adequate sanitary conditions), while beet sugar tastes unpleasant. Molasses (fodder molasses) also differ in taste - an important by-product sugar production: cane in England is readily eaten, and beet is not good for food.

Production.

If the refining of beet sugar is carried out directly at sugar beet factories, then the purification of cane sugar, in which only 96-97% of sucrose, requires special refineries, where contaminants are separated from raw sugar crystals: ash, water and components, united by the general concept of "non-sugar ". The latter include scraps of vegetable fibers, wax that covered the stalk of the reed, protein, small amounts of cellulose, salts and fats. It is only thanks to the huge scale of production of refined cane and beet sugar that this product is so cheap today.

Consumption.

According to statistics, the consumption of refined sugar in the country is directly proportional to per capita income. The leaders here include, for example, Australia, Ireland and Denmark, where over 45 kg of refined sugar per person per year, while in China - only 6.1 kg. In many tropical countries where sugarcane is grown, this figure is much lower than in the United States (41.3 kg), but people there have the opportunity to consume sucrose in other than pure form, but in a different form, usually as part of fruits and sugary drinks.

CANE SUGAR

Plant.

Sugar cane ( Saccharum officinarum) is a perennial, very tall herbaceous species of the cereal family, cultivated in tropical and subtropical regions for its sucrose content, as well as some by-products of sugar production. The plant resembles bamboo: its cylindrical stems, often reaching a height of 6–7.3 m and a thickness of 1.5–8 cm, grow in bunches. Sugar is obtained from their juice. At the nodes of the stems are buds, or "eyes", which develop into short side shoots. From them, cuttings are used to propagate cane. Seeds are formed in apical inflorescences-panicles. They are used for breeding new varieties and only in exceptional cases as seed. The plant needs a lot of sun, heat and water, as well as fertile soil. That is why sugarcane is cultivated only in areas with a hot and humid climate.

Under favorable conditions, it grows very quickly, its plantations before harvesting look like impenetrable jungles. In Louisiana (USA), sugar cane matures in 6-7 months, in Cuba it takes a year, and in Hawaii - 1.5-2 years. To ensure the maximum content of sucrose in the stems (10-17% of the mass), the crop is harvested as soon as the plant stops growing in height. If harvesting is done by hand (using long machete knives), the shoots are cut down close to the ground, after which the leaves are removed and the stems are cut into short pieces that are convenient for processing. Manual harvesting is used where labor is cheap or site conditions prevent efficient use of machines. On large plantations, the technique is usually used, after burning the lower tier of vegetation. Fire destroys the bulk of the weeds without damaging the sugar cane, and the mechanization of the process significantly reduces the cost of production.

Story.

The right to be considered the birthplace of sugar cane is disputed by two regions - the fertile valleys in the north-east of India and the islands of Polynesia in the southern part. Pacific Ocean. However, botanical studies, ancient literary sources and etymological data speak in favor of India. Many woody wild-growing varieties of sugarcane found there do not differ in their main features from modern cultural forms. Sugarcane is mentioned in the Laws of Manu and other sacred books of the Hindus. The word "sugar" itself comes from the Sanskrit sarkara (gravel, sand or sugar); centuries later, the term entered Arabic as sukkar, into medieval Latin as succarum.

From India the sugar cane culture between 1800 and 1700 B.C. entered China. This is evidenced by several Chinese sources, reporting that the Chinese people who lived in the Ganges valley taught the Chinese to get sugar by digesting its stems. From China, ancient navigators probably brought it to the Philippines, Java, and even Hawaii. When Spanish sailors arrived in the Pacific many centuries later, sugarcane had already grown feral on many Pacific islands.

Apparently, the first mention of sugar in ancient times dates back to the time of Alexander the Great's campaign in India. In 327 BC one of his commanders, Nearchus, reported: “They say that in India there is a reed growing that gives honey without the help of bees; as if from it you can also make an intoxicating drink, although there are no fruits on this plant. Five hundred years later, Galen, the chief medical authority of the ancient world, recommended "sakcharon from India and Arabia" as a remedy for diseases of the stomach, intestines, and kidneys. The Persians, too, although much later, adopted from the Hindus the habit of eating sugar, and at the same time did a lot to improve the methods of its purification. As early as the 700s, Nestorian monks in the Euphrates valley were successfully making white sugar using ashes to clean it.

The Arabs, who spread from the 7th to the 9th centuries. their possessions in the Middle East, North Africa and Spain, brought the culture of sugar cane to the Mediterranean. A few centuries later, the crusaders who returned from the Holy Land introduced sugar to all of Western Europe. As a result of the collision of these two great expansions, Venice, which found itself at the crossroads of the trade routes of the Muslim and Christian worlds, eventually became the center of the European sugar trade and remained so for more than 500 years.

At the beginning of the 15th century Portuguese and Spanish sailors introduced sugarcane culture to the islands of the Atlantic Ocean. His plantations appeared first in Madeira, the Azores and the Cape Verde Islands. In 1506, Pedro de Atienza ordered the planting of sugarcane in Santo Domingo (Haiti) - thus this culture penetrated into New World. In just some 30 years after its appearance in the Caribbean, it spread there so widely that it became one of the main ones in the West Indies, which is now called the "sugar islands". The role of sugar produced here grew rapidly with an increase in demand for it in the countries of Northern Europe, especially after the Turks captured Constantinople in 1453 and the importance of the Eastern Mediterranean as a supplier of sugar fell.

With the spread of sugarcane in the West Indies and the penetration of its culture into South America more and more workers were required for its cultivation and processing. The natives, who survived the invasion of the first conquerors, turned out to be of little use for exploitation, and the planters found a way out in the importation of slaves from Africa. Ultimately, sugar production became inextricably linked to the slave system and the bloody riots it generated that rocked the West Indies in the 18th and 19th centuries. In the early days, sugar cane presses were powered by oxen or horses. Later, in places blown by the trade winds, they were replaced by more efficient wind turbines. However, production as a whole was still quite primitive. After squeezing raw cane, the resulting juice was purified with lime, clay or ash, and then evaporated in copper or iron vats, under which a fire was built. Refining was reduced to the dissolution of the crystals, boiling the mixture and subsequent re-crystallization. Even in our time, the remains of stone millstones and abandoned copper vats remind in the West Indies of the past owners of the islands, who made their fortunes in this profitable trade. By the middle of the 17th century. Santo Domingo and Brazil became the main producers of sugar in the world.

Sugarcane first appeared on the territory of the modern United States in 1791 in Louisiana, where it was brought by the Jesuits from Santo Domingo. True, it was grown here at first mainly in order to chew sweet stems. However, forty years later, two enterprising colonists, Antonio Mendez and Etienne de Boret, established his plantations in what is now New Orleans, with the goal of producing refined sugar for sale. After de Boret's success in this business, other landowners followed suit, and sugar cane began to be cultivated throughout Louisiana.

In the future, the main events in the history of cane sugar come down to important improvements in the technology of its cultivation, mechanical processing and final purification of the product.

Recycling.

The cane is first crushed to facilitate further squeezing of juice from it. Then it goes to a three-roller squeezing press. Usually, the cane is pressed twice, wetting between the first and second time with water to dilute the sweet liquid contained in the pulp (this process is called maceration).

The resulting so-called. " diffusion juice» (usually gray or dark green) contains sucrose, glucose, gum, pectin substances, acids and all sorts of pollution. Methods for its purification over the centuries have changed little. Previously, the juice was heated in large vats over an open fire, and ash was added to remove "non-sugars"; now, to precipitate impurities, lime milk is used. Where sugar is produced for local consumption, the diffusion juice is treated with sulfur dioxide (sulfur dioxide) immediately before lime is added to speed up bleaching and purification. Sugar turns yellowish, i.e. not completely refined, but quite pleasant to the taste. In both cases, after adding lime, the juice is poured into a sump-illuminator and kept there at 110-116 ° C under pressure.

Next milestone in the production of raw sugar - evaporation. The juice flows through pipes to evaporators, where it is heated by steam passing through a closed system of pipes. When the dry matter concentration reaches 40–50%, evaporation is continued in vacuum apparatuses. The result is a mass of sugar crystals suspended in thick molasses, the so-called. massecuite. The massecuite is centrifuged, removing molasses through the mesh walls of the centrifuge, in which only sucrose crystals remain. The purity of this raw sugar is 96–97%. The removed molasses (outflow of the massecuite) is boiled again, crystallized and centrifuged. The resulting second portion of raw sugar is somewhat less pure. Then another crystallization is carried out. The remaining edema often still contains up to 50% sucrose, but it is no longer able to crystallize due to the large amount of impurities. This product ("black molasses") goes to the USA mainly for livestock feed. In some countries, for example in India, where the soil is in dire need of fertilizers, the outflow of the massecuite is simply plowed into the ground.

Refining

its briefly boils down to the following. First, raw sugar is mixed with sugar syrup to dissolve the remaining molasses enveloping the crystals. The resulting mixture (affination massecuite) is centrifuged. The centrifuged crystals are washed with steam to give an off-white product. It is dissolved, turning into thick syrup, lime and phosphoric acid are added there so that impurities float to the surface in the form of flakes, and then filtered through bone char (a black granular material obtained from animal bones). The main task at this stage is the complete discoloration and deashing of the product. Refining 45 kg of dissolved raw sugar consumes 4.5 to 27 kg of bone charcoal. The exact ratio is not established, since the absorbency of the filter decreases as it is used. The resulting white mass is evaporated and, after crystallization, centrifuged, i.e. they treat it in much the same way as with sugar cane juice, after which the refined sugar is dried, removing the remains (approx. 1%) of water from it.

Production.

Major producers include Brazil, India, Cuba, as well as China, Mexico, Pakistan, USA, Thailand, Australia and the Philippines.

BEET SUGAR

Plant.

In sugar beet ( beta vulgaris) use a long, silvery-white root (from which sugar is obtained) and a rosette of leaves (tops), which serve as excellent fodder for livestock. The root in its thickest part reaches 10–15 cm in diameter, and its thin processes penetrate the soil to a depth of 90–120 cm. The average root weight is approx. 1 kg; up to 15% is sucrose in it, which corresponds to about 14 teaspoons of granulated sugar. Sugar beet is grown mainly in the temperate zone, and since each plant consumes an average of approx. 55 liters of water, the culture requires abundant watering. By the time of harvesting, the water content in the roots can reach 75-80%, and in the tops - 90%.

According to the efficiency of photosynthesis, i.e. converting solar energy and inorganic substances into nutritious organic substances, sugar beet occupies one of the first places among plants. Her origin is not exactly known. Scientists believe that in prehistoric times it was a wild annual in Southern Europe and North Africa. Later, having got into areas with a cooler climate, the sugar beet became a biennial, storing sugar in the root in the first year, and producing seeds in the second. Now it is harvested at the end of the first growing season, when the mass of the roots and their sugar content are maximum.

Story.

According to Spanish explorers, the Indians in the Santa Clara River Valley in what is now California made some kind of sweets from the juice of wild sugar beets. In Europe, the fact that beets contain sugar was already known in the 16th century, but it was not until 1747 that the German chemist A. Marggraf obtained crystalline sucrose from it. The most important event in the history of beet sugar took place in 1799, when laboratory experiments by F. Achard confirmed that the production of this product was justified from an economic point of view. As a result, as early as 1802 sugar-beet factories appeared in Silesia (Germany).

At the beginning of the 19th century during the Napoleonic Wars, the British fleet blocked the coast of France, and the import of sugar from the West Indies there was temporarily stopped. This forced Napoleon to turn to the German model and build a number of experimental beet sugar factories. In 1811, things were already well established: sugar beet crops occupied over 32,000 hectares, and refineries were operating throughout the country.

After the defeat of Napoleon, the European market was literally inundated with Caribbean sugar, and the newly emerged beet sugar industry began to decline. Interest in it, however, increased again during the reigns of Louis Philippe and Napoleon III, and since then it has been one of the important branches of the French economy.

In America, beet sugar was talked about in the 1830s. The association that arose in Philadelphia delegated its representatives to Europe to study its production. From 1838 to 1879, about 14 unsuccessful attempts were made in the United States to establish the production of beet sugar. The real disaster befell the Mormons in the 1850s when they bought $12,500 worth of equipment from France, shipped it to New Orleans, then up the Mississippi to Kansas, finally from there by oxen to Utah, but they launched it like that failed. Success was achieved by E. Dyer, who applied new production methods in California. Thanks to him, America's own sugar beet production arose. Since then, it has been continuously developed, and now the share of beet sugar is approx. 25% of all refined sugar produced in the USA.

Recycling.

Sugar beet is a bulky and perishable product, so processing plants are usually built close to plantations. It takes approx. 27 kg of coal and 16 kg of lime and coke. The process consists of the stages already described: extraction, purification, evaporation and crystallization.

First, the beets are washed, and then cut into shavings, which are loaded into a diffuser, where the sugar is extracted from the plant mass hot water. The result is a "diffusion juice" containing 10 to 15% sucrose. The remaining beet pulp serves as an excellent fodder for livestock. Diffusion juice is mixed in a saturator with lime milk. Heavy impurities settle here. Carbon dioxide is then passed through the heated solution to cause the lime to bind the non-sugar. After filtering them, they get the so-called. "Pure Juice" Bleaching involves passing sulfur dioxide gas through it and then filtering it through activated carbon. Excess water is removed by evaporation. The resulting liquid contains 50 to 65% sugar.

Crystallization is carried out in huge vacuum containers, sometimes as high as a two-story house. Its product - massecuite - is a mixture of molasses with sucrose crystals. These components are separated by centrifugation, and the resulting solid sugar is dried. Unlike cane, it does not require further refining and is suitable for consumption.

From molasses (the first runoff), a second, and then a third batch of already less pure crystals is obtained by evaporation. They are dissolved and refined.

Production.

The main producers are Russia, Germany, USA, France, Poland, China, Turkey and Italy. In Europe, almost all sugar is obtained from sugar beets. In the USA, the sugar beet harvest in 1991 was 24,982,000 tons; it is grown mainly in Minnesota, California, Idaho and North Dakota.

MAPLE SUGAR AND SYRUP

Maple syrup is brown in color, very sweet and has a strong, distinctive flavor that results from the reactions that occur during its manufacture. Maple sugar and syrup are produced almost exclusively in the northeastern United States, mainly in the states of Vermont and New York. Both sugar and syrup are obtained mainly from the apiary of black, red, silver and sugar maples growing in these areas. By itself, it does not have a special taste, but contains an average of 3% sucrose. One tree produces from 38 to 95 liters of apiary per year, from which 35 times less syrup is obtained.

American Indians added it instead of salt to cereals, soups and even meat dishes. They also taught the collection and processing of maple apiary to European settlers who tried to drain birch and gray walnut for the same purpose. The first written mention of this product dates back to 1760; it follows that maples grow in Canada, "giving a large amount of useful refreshing juice" suitable for making special sugar. The Winnebag and Chippewa tribes supplied large quantities of it to the Northwest Fur Company. Most maple sugar and syrup were produced between 1850 and 1890. In the future, the role of these products has declined, mainly because cane sugar is much cheaper. Nowadays, maple syrup is valued only for its special flavor and is consumed mainly with waffles and pancakes.

The tapping is usually carried out from the end of February to the end of April; during this period, cold dry nights and sunny days contribute to sap flow. A hole 1.5 cm in diameter is drilled in a tree trunk to a depth of 5 cm and a wooden or metal groove is inserted into it, through which the juice flows into the trough. Since it can quickly ferment, the portions collected during the day are immediately sent for evaporation. Processing proceeds in general according to the same scheme as in the case of sugar cane, although the technology here is somewhat simpler.

I happened to visit a sugar factory, where I got acquainted with the process of making a product familiar to everyone - sugar.
Actually, it all starts with the entrance, where guests are first greeted by a gilded V.I. Lenin, somehow hinting with his gesture: “Comrade, look! Sweet there, for God's sake!
And most importantly, don't cheat. Sugar is really there, in commercial quantities.

Everyone knows that sugar cane does not grow in our country and sugar has to be extracted from beets, this not at all glamorous root crop.

Cars heavily laden with beet are driven to the acceptance point

Weigh and then unload the contents of bodies and trailers into the bunker

It should be noted that the entire production process is automated, as evidenced by the presence of a variety of panels and consoles at all key points in the technological chain.

From the bunker, the root crops fall on the conveyor belt, which carries the raw materials into the dungeon.

It is clear that before using the beets, you need to clean it from the ground, tops, adhering stones, sand and other impurities - all this cannot get into the finished product in any case, but it is easy to ruin the equipment. To do this, the beet, following the path of supply to the production, passes through various straw traps, stone traps, sand traps. For the final cleaning of beets from contamination, root crops pass through a beet washer.

The whole process is controlled by the operator. On the monitor on the right is a diagram of the processes taking place at the cleaning and washing area, which displays operational information. The monitor on the left displays a video from a camera installed above the belt conveyor, through which the washed raw materials go to the next section.

And here is the same conveyor that the camera is looking at. Clean root crops are sent to the beet cutter.

Beet roots are fed into the beet cutter hopper and carried inside the housing, where under the influence of centrifugal force they are pressed against the cutting edge of the knives, sliding along which the beet is gradually cut into beet shavings. It is problematic to observe the process itself, but the knives look like this:

The "sugar recoverability" depends very much on the quality of the chips. It should be of a certain thickness, with a smooth, crack-free surface.

The chips obtained at the previous stage are sent along the belt conveyor to the diffusion apparatus.
Inside the diffusion column there is a screw (such a thing as in a meat grinder), with the help of which the chips move at a certain speed from the bottom up. Opposite to the movement, water continuously flows through the column of chips from top to bottom. Passing through the crushed raw materials, the water dissolves the sugar in the beet chips and becomes saturated with it. The whole process takes place without air access and at a certain temperature. As a result of the process, juice saturated with sugar accumulates at the bottom of the column, and pulp (sugar-free beet chips) is unloaded from the upper part of the apparatus.

Freshly squeezed pulp enters the pulp dryer. This is a huge, continuously rotating drum, inside which the pulp is dried in a stream of hot gas.

Dried beet pulp granules are picked up by the air flow of a pneumatic conveyor and carried away through pipes to a warehouse for subsequent sale - the “squeezed out” beet cut is fed to livestock.

The juice obtained in the process of diffusion, in addition to the sucrose we need (that is, sugar), contains many different substances, united by the term “non-sugar”. All non-sugars, to a greater or lesser extent, interfere with the production of crystalline sugar and increase the loss of a useful product. And the next technological challenge is the removal of non-sugars from sugar solutions. Why use various physical and chemical processes.

The juice is mixed with milk of lime, heated, and the precipitate is precipitated. Predefinition, defecation (that's right, I didn't misheard and didn't make a seal - in Russian it's just cleansing), saturation and many other interesting terms. At one of the stages, the juice is filtered in such installations

Along the perimeter of the filtration apparatus one can see glass flasks through which the purified juice is driven.

The resulting juice is thickened by evaporation. The resulting syrup is boiled until it crystallizes. "Cooking" sugar - major operation in the preparation of a sweet product. In the photo - our guide and chief technologist at the control point of the boiling section

Before us is the heart of production - vacuum devices for boiling syrup. "Cooking" takes place in a rarefied atmosphere, due to which the syrup boils at 70 degrees Celsius. With more high temperatures the sugar will just burn. How it happens in a frying pan :) The control panel is visible on the left. At one point, one of them yelled a siren and turned on a red flasher, signaling the need for human intervention in the automated process. Immediately one of the workers appeared and the console fell silent with satisfaction.

The device can be "milked" a little and visually check the quality of the syrup.

The syrup on the glass slide crystallizes before our eyes. It's practically sugar!

Boiled syrup - massecuite, sent for centrifugation

In the centrifuge, all excess is separated from the massecuite and goes into a special collection under the installation. And on the walls of the drum there are crystals of granulated sugar. The following photos were taken within one minute and clearly show a trace of sugar.

Unloaded from centrifuges, wet granulated sugar is transported for drying

Drying plant. The drum is spinning. Sugar inside the drum is blown with hot air (more than 100 degrees).

After drying, the sugar is cooled to room temperature with continuous mixing in the same plant. At this time, you can get to it from the end and open a secret hatch!

The dryer drum rotates and the sugar is poured, cooling.

It's time to try finished products to taste! Sweet!

Dried and cooled granulated sugar is fed to the sieving machine. The photo does not convey movement, but the whole structure sways like a sieve in the hands of a grandmother :)

At the end of the sieving, the sugar is sent for packing.

Unfortunately, at the packing station, I was asked not to shoot. Filming was allowed only after the end of the work shift and the stop of the conveyor.

The photo shows semi-automatic packing bins, next to which packers sit on benches. A bag is taken from the stack, put on the neck of the hopper, the dispenser pours 50 kg into the bag. After that, the conveyor belt shifts, the neck of the bag enters the “sewing machine”, which sews the bag and then the sewn bag goes to the warehouse along the conveyor belt.

The company also has an automatic packaging line, it is almost the same, only there are no packers. All the action takes place in a translucent tunnel, in fact, you can only see how the machine picks up a bag from a stack, puts it on the bell of the bunker, loads a portion of granulated sugar, then sews it up and sends it to the finished product. For some reason, there were no photos of the process. Apparently he was hypnotized by self-propelled bags :)

That's all.

p.s. The production is very noisy, I did not catch much of what was said. So if I was not accurate in describing the technology and processes, do not blame me.

Several hundred different sugars are known in nature. Each green plant forms certain substances belonging to this group. In the process of photosynthesis, glucose is first formed from atmospheric carbon dioxide and water obtained mainly from the soil under the influence of solar energy, and then it is converted into other sugars. In different parts of the world, some other products are also used, such as CORN MOLUSK, MAPLE SYRUP, HONEY, SORGE, PALMA, and MALT SUGAR.

The Aztecs used corn syrup as a sweetener, a highly viscous, almost colorless liquid obtained directly from cornstarch. They made it (sweet syrup) from corn in much the same way that sugar is made from cane today. Molasses is much inferior to refined sugar in terms of sweetness, however, it makes it possible to regulate the crystallization process in the manufacture of sweets and is much cheaper than sugar, therefore it is widely used in confectionery.

Honey, which is high in fructose and glucose, is more expensive than sugar, and is added to some foods only when you want to give them a special taste. In the Bible, honey is mentioned quite often, and "sweet cane" only twice, from which we can conclude that it was honey that served as the main sweetener in biblical times; this, by the way, is also confirmed by historical evidence, according to which sugar cane began to be grown in the Middle East in the first centuries of our era.

CANADENS use MAPLE SYRUP INSTEAD OF SUGAR, which is valued primarily for its specific flavor. It contains 3 times more calcium than brown sugar, but there is no copper at all. But there is a very useful women's health magnesium.

IN CHINA - A sugary syrup is obtained from the stalks of corn sorghum.

INDIA is practically the only country where PALM SUGAR is produced on a commercial scale, but this country produces much more cane sugar.

In Japan, for over 2000 years, MALT SUGAR, PRODUCED FROM STARCH RICE OR MILLET, has been used as a sweet additive. This substance (maltose) can also be obtained with the help of yeast from ordinary starch. It is much inferior to sucrose in terms of sweetness, however, it is used in the manufacture of bakery products and various types of baby food. Prehistoric man satisfied his need for sugar through honey and fruits. Some flowers probably served the same purpose, the nectar of which contains a small amount of sucrose.

SUGAR FROM FLOWERS...

In India, more than 4,000 years ago, a kind of raw sugar was mined from the flowers of the Madhuca tree.

The Africans in the Cape Colony used the species Melianthus major for this, and the Boers in South Africa used Protea cynaroides.

Am I fed up with my ideas yet?
I can offer a completely different topic - tell us about sugar, especially why nowadays it has become not as sweet as it used to be, what they began to do with it.

Sugar is a sweet product that a person learned to extract from sugar cane quite a long time ago. This perennial herb of the genus Saccharum was cultivated in India as early as 3000 BC. When in 327 BC. e. The warriors of Alexander the Great set foot on Indian soil, their attention, among countless miracles, was attracted by an unknown white solid substance of sweet taste - the first raw sugar in the history of mankind.

This was told to mankind by the Greek historian Onesikrit, who accompanied Alexander the Great on campaigns and was amazed by the fact that "in India, the reed gives honey without bees." The Indians called the sweet crystals, which were extracted from sugar cane juice, "sakkara", from the ancient Indian "sarkar" (literally: "gravel, pebbles, sand, granulated sugar"). The root of the word subsequently entered many languages: in Greek saccharon, in Latin saccharum, in Persian šdkdr, in Arabic sukkar, in Italian zucchero, in France first zucre, then sucre, in England sugar, in Spain azъcar, in Germany's Zucker and finally Russia's "sugar".

It is about this sweet substance, which is sometimes called the "sweet life", then the "white death" that will be discussed today. As expected, first we will plunge a little into Her Majesty's history.

Man has always had an instinctive attraction to the taste of sugar, so the history of sugar is intertwined with the history of nature, which generously gave us thousands of plants and fruits containing sugar.

Sugarcane and honey, in the several millennia that preceded the industrial age, established themselves as the favored suppliers of sugar to mankind. Sugarcane, indeed, contained a highly concentrated, easily extractable sugar, sucrose, which was fairly simple to produce artisanally and not difficult to store.

Sugarcane has been used since the primitive times and has been cultivated since ancient times. According to the most recent theories, the botanical origin of "sacharum robustum" originates in New Guinea and adjacent islands. From here, sugar cane first of all moved to the east, settling in the Hebrides, New Caledonia, and the Fiji Islands. Later, sugarcane moved west and northwest, reaching the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Indochina and China.

Sugarcane, brought by the Arabs from India, began to be cultivated in the Middle East as early as the 3rd century BC, and, most likely, it was the Persians who were the first to make a kind of refined sugar by repeatedly digesting raw sugar. It is quite natural that the enterprising Spaniards and Portuguese, who got acquainted with this sweet plant from the same Arabs, eventually founded its plantations in the Canaries, Madeira and Cape Verde. There was no need to talk about the benefits - at the beginning of the 14th century in England they gave 44 pounds sterling for 1 pound of sugar, which, in terms of modern prices, is about $ 1 per teaspoon. That is why in the Middle Ages sugar remained a curiosity and was even considered a medicine. However, a number of historians dispute this opinion, believing that, although sugar was sold in pharmacies in the Middle Ages, in this case, pharmacists acted as ordinary shopkeepers who were instructed to "supply fellow citizens with sweet gingerbread and sugar."

Indian heritage tells us that sugar cane has been known and used since antiquity by the inhabitants of the Bay of Bengal. Near Rajmahal, there are the ruins of the city, which bore the name Gur (Sugar) and even Bengal itself was called differently Gur or Gaura (country of sugar). In ancient Indian poems, the virtues of sugar are described, to which mythology ascribes a divine origin. In China, they learned about "cane sugar" for many millennia BC. Jews mention several times in the Old Testament cane sugar brought from India and China.

It seems thanks to Neark, admiral of Alexander the Great, that Westerners learned about the existence of sugar cane 325 years before Christ. Nearc, who explored the Indian Ocean, spoke of reeds that yield honey.

Despite the fact that the historical origin of sugar is surrounded by mystery and darkness, it is known for certain that the word sugar has an Indian etymology.
The Sanskrit term "sarkara" gave birth to all Indo-European versions of sugar: sukkar in Arabic, saccharum in Latin, zucchero in Italian, seker in Turkish, zucker in German, sugar in English, sucre in French.
Sugar caravans.

Around the 3rd century BC, Indian and Persian traders began to carry sugar to the coast of the eastern Mediterranean, to Egypt and Arabia. Many ancient writers wrote about white matter and its possible uses in medicine and nutrition.

In the first century AD, the historian Pliny, in his work on natural history, speaks of sugar as follows: “Arabia produces sugar, but that from India is more famous. It is honey obtained from cane. It is white………., breaks with teeth, the largest pieces are the size of a hazelnut. It is only used in medicine." (Historia Naturalis, Book II, 17). Based on this text, it can be concluded that sugar was now a solid product, which facilitated its transportation by caravans through Central Asia to the Mediterranean ports, from where he went on to Greece and the Roman Empire.

However, the use of sugar remains rather limited until the time when the Arabs invaded Asia in the 7th century, bringing sugar cane from there and attempting to acclimatize it in the Mediterranean countries they occupy. Thus, sugar cane was able to take root first of all in Egypt, then in the Nile Valley and Palestine, on the Jordan coast. The Arabs taught the Persians the art of making hard sugar. Under their influence, sugar cane soon conquers Syria, all of North Africa, Cyprus, Rhodes, the Balearic Islands, then the south of Spain.

Meanwhile, Christian Europe practically ignores this exotic product, which gradually appears in the royal courts and at some apothecaries, arriving with caravans from distant Asia.

Thanks to the crusaders since the 12th century, sugar is gaining more and more fame and distribution. They open in Syria and Palestine sugarcane plantations cultivated by the Arabs. Thanks to their efforts, the precious cane is based on the Greek archipelago, Sicily, in southern Italy and France.

The new "spice" is sold by pharmacists at very high prices and in various forms: powdered sugar, cone-shaped, shapeless sugar heads.

The East remains the main supplier of sugar to Western countries, whose needs are constantly growing.

The sugar trade begins to develop and Venice, which exercises a monopoly of trade with the eastern Mediterranean, becomes the sugar capital of Europe. In the 14th and 15th century, Venetian merchants pick up sugar from India in Alexandria. This sugar is processed and refined in Venice, where, in the middle of the 15th century, the sugar processing industry was born.

After the sugar has acquired tapered shape, he went all over Europe. Documentary sources claim that from 1319 Venice supplied England with 100,000 livres of sugar at a time.

At the beginning of the 15th century, sugar cane reached the Atlantic Islands. Don Henri, regent of Portugal, in 1420 captures Madeira and cultivates there since great success sugar cane brought from Sicily. The Spaniards are also starting to grow cane in the Canary Islands. The products of the Atlantic Islands begin to compete with the East. In 1497, Vasco de Gama opened the Cape of Good Hope, which opened the way from India to the Portuguese navigators, who would soon force the Venetian merchants out of the sugar trade. Now Lisbon is becoming the capital of sugar processing and supplies it to most of Europe.

Sugarcane discovers America

The discovery of the New World marked a turning point in the history of sugar. After his second trip, in 1493, Christopher Columbus planted sugarcane originating from the Canary Islands in Saint Domingo.

Around 1505, sugar was made for the first time on this island, the cradle of sugar production in the New World. In 1518, there were already 28 sugar factories in San Domingo, the right to import sugar into Spain allowed Charles Quint to build a palace in Madrid and Toledo. From San Domingo, the sugarcane culture extended from 1510 to 1520 as far as Puerto Rico, Cuba and Jamaica.

Simultaneously, sugar cane was introduced to Mexico by Fernando Cortés in 1519 and to Peru by Francesco Pizarro in 1533. The Portuguese, who conquered Brazil in 1500, planted sugar cane there after 1520.

The impetus was given and all the new countries discovered and colonized during the 16th century and at the beginning of the 17th century are covered with sugar plantations.

Describing his journey through the Spanish colonies in 1620, Antonio Vasquez de Espinosa notes that he met plantations equipped with factories for the production of sugar in almost all the countries he visited, from Mexico to San Juan and Chile, as well as in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Paraguay.

It was not until the first half of the 17th century that the French in Martinique and Guadeloupe, in their turn, made an attempt to grow sugar cane and produce sugar.

The British, who colonized Barbados (1627), set up a sugar industry there (in 1676, Barbados could export 400 ships of sugar to England, 150 tons each). The history of the colonization of the Antilles is colored by the ongoing struggle for it by several countries: Spain, Holland, England and France.

Martinique and Guadeloupe continue their sugar expansion: in 1790, Martinique's production was 11,300 tons and Guadeloupe's production was 10,600 tons. The French introduced sugar cane to Louisiana in 1751.
The Caribbean is a sugar granary.

For 3 centuries, the Caribbean islands have been a real world “sugar granary”. Meanwhile, sugarcane continued its world tour around the globe. He finds a surprisingly favorable site in the French islands of the Indian Ocean. Lille de France (Mauritius) and Bourbon Island (Reunion) are covered with sugar plantations. Continuing its journey, sugarcane conquers Indonesia, Formosa, the Philippines and the Hawaiian Islands.

IN early XIX century, the sugarcane has completed its round-the-world journey. It lasted 2000 years. Starting its journey from the Pacific Islands, sugar cane has conquered all continents.

Many countries started sugar production, some stopped it, because its growth has always been subject to the laws of competition.

This first part of his story shows us that sugar is an international product, it is a food, like spices, that travels non-stop, and that is most often consumed by people thousands of miles from where it is produced.

Since that time, the European nations, the main consumers of sugar, have been trying to achieve self-sufficiency by creating sugar production in their colonies. They have their own trading network, transport and processing. Sugar factories appear in all major European ports. After Venice and Lisbon, Antwerp becomes in the 16th century the first sugar center in Europe. In England, the number of sugar factories grew, in Germany there were already several factories at the end of the 16th century (Dresden, Ogsburg), there were already 25 of them at the end of the 18th century. Rouen, Nantes, La Rochelle, Marseille become the main centers for the production of sugar for France.

On the eve of the revolution, France acquired the first place in the trade and production of sugar in Europe; most of sugar, which she received mainly from the Antilles, was sent further to the north of Europe, to Holland, Germany, and Scandinavia. France also becomes one of the largest European consumers of sugar (about 80,000 tons in 1789).
Continental blockade breeds beet sugar.

The French Revolution of 1789 and the international conflicts it created paralyzed the French sugar trade, which was completely dependent on maritime transport. In 1792, France is at war with Great Britain, whose powerful fleet interferes with regular communication with the American colonies. From the first unrest there was a restriction in the consumption of sugar, the price of which in 1795 increased 10 times compared to the beginning of the revolution.

The situation worsens when Napoleon establishes the Continental Block (Berlin, November 21, 1806), which closes all continental ports to English trade. French islands in the hands of the British. In 1808, sugar could not be found in Paris or any other major European city. And so the idea was born to produce sugar in France, based on a plant growing on the continent, arousing the interest of numerous researchers. Sugar beet becomes the most suitable plant for sugar production.

Since 1575, Olivier de Serres has described the presence of sugar in this plant in his work The Theater of Agricultural Culture. Much later, in 1745, the German chemist Marggraf presented his ideas to the Berlin Academy of Sciences. chemical experiments, in order to extract real sugar from various plants growing on the continent. In his scientific work Marggraf urged his compatriots to start growing sugar beets and producing sugar. In 1786, Marggraf's pupil, Frederick Ashard, built the first experimental factory, the results of which were so satisfactory that factories were built in Silisia and Bohemia in the following years. The fame of Ashard's works is enormous. In France, two small sugar factories were built in the Paris region, in Shelley and Saint-Coin. However, the results they achieved were mediocre, as the sugar they produced was inferior in quality to cane sugar and at a high cost.

Cane sugar began to successfully conquer Europe from here, having reached Rus' around the 12th century.

The Russian word "sugar" goes back to the Sanskrit "sarkara" (sarcara), "sakkara" (sakkara). These names refer to condensed juice, unrefined sugar crystals that have become the subject of trade. The basis of this name of sugar entered many languages ​​of the world.

However, it was not until the 16th century that it first appeared on the market as an “overseas commodity”. royal table in connection with the development of maritime trade through Arkhangelsk ....

What is sugar?

The entire range of sugar can be divided into groups depending on its appearance. It is white crystalline, unrefined (brown), and liquid sugar. There are various types of sugar produced specifically for the needs Food Industry, and many of them are not intended for sale in stores directly to the public.

crystal sugar

Crystalline sugar is the most familiar type of sugar to the consumer worldwide. It is granulated sugar, consisting of crystals white color. Depending on the size of the crystal, granulated sugar provides unique properties granulated sugar. These properties are in demand by food companies in accordance with their specific needs. In addition to the size of the crystals, special additives add variety to the types of sugar.

Regular Sugar. Sugar commonly used in household use. This is exactly the white sugar that most cookbook recipes have in mind. The same sugar is most widely used by food companies.

Fruit Sugar. Smaller and better quality than regular sugar. Used in dry mixes such as gelatin desserts, pudding mixes and dry drinks. The high degree of crystal homogeneity prevents smaller crystals from separating or settling to the bottom of the package, which is an important quality of good dry mixes.

Pekarsky (Bakers Special). The size of the crystals is even smaller. As the name suggests, this type of sugar was created specifically for industrial baking of muffins.

Ultrafine (Superfine, Ultrafine, Bar Sugar, Caster Sugar). The smallest crystal size. Such sugar is ideal for pies and meringues with a very fine texture. Due to its easy solubility, ultrafine sugar is also used to sweeten fruits and frozen drinks.

Confectionery powder (Confectioners Sugar, Icing Sugar). At the core confectionery powder lies ordinary granulated sugar, ground into powder and sifted through a fine sieve. Approximately 3% corn starch is added to prevent sticking. Powder is released varying degrees grinding. It is used for glazing, in the confectionery industry and in the production of whipped cream.

Coarse Sugar. Sugar with a crystal size larger than regular sugar. A special processing method makes this sugar resistant to changes at high temperatures. This property is important in the production of sweets, confectionery and liqueurs.

Sugar dusting (Sanding Sugar). Sugar with the most large crystals. It is used mainly in the baking and confectionery industries for sprinkling products. The facets of the large crystals reflect the light, giving the products a sparkling look.

Unrefined (brown) sugar

Brown sugar consists of sugar crystals coated in treacle syrup with a natural flavor and color. Produced either by special boiling sugar syrup, or by mixing white sugar with molasses.

There are many varieties of brown sugar, which differ mainly in the amount of molasses (molasses) they contain. Dark brown sugar has a more intense color and stronger molasses flavor than light brown sugar.

Light brown sugar is used in the same way as white sugar. Dark brown sugar has a rich flavor that makes it a specific addition to various foods.

Liquid Sugar

There are several types of liquid sugar that have been used in the food industry. Actually liquid sugar is a solution of white sugar and can be used wherever crystalline.

Sugar with the addition of molasses is an amber-colored liquid. It can be used to give products a specific flavor.

Finally, invert syrup. Inversion or chemical breakdown of sucrose gives a mixture of glucose and fructose. Such sugar is used only for industrial purposes.

And now about the benefits and harms of this product.

One of the highest levels in the ranking of the most popular products is sugar. As a rule, many people add sugar to tea, coffee, or complete their meal with some kind of dessert. At the same time, when it comes to the benefits and harms of sugar, everyone confidently asserts that this sweet pleasure has a detrimental effect on human health. The people came up with sugar by no means attractive names: “ main enemy humanity”, “sweet death”, “white death”. At the same time, during the war years or in difficult times of famine, people always stocked up on this sweet product.

Mother nature arranged it so that the human body cannot cope without providing sugar. Numerous fruits, vegetables, nuts contain an abundance of organic natural sugar fructose, which is quite easily absorbed by the body. From early childhood, if a person does not receive carbohydrates in their natural form from healthy foods, he automatically reaches for sweets, chocolate, cakes and gradually gets used to these far from useful sugar substitutes. As a result, excessive sugar dependence of many people, which is also called "sugarholism", involuntarily turns out. People who have grown up eating grapes, dates, dried fruits, sweet vegetables, and honey will not crave sugary foods.

What is the benefit and harm of sugar, why does a person simultaneously love and fear this sweet product? Despite the fact that sugar is the main source of energy for our body, the number of people suffering from diabetes.

Entering the body, sugar under the influence of digestive juices is broken down into glucose and fructose, and enters the bloodstream. Insulin, produced by the pancreas, normalizes blood sugar levels, distributing it throughout the cells of the body. Excess sugar accumulates in the body, turning into not quite aesthetic folds of fat on the abdomen, thighs and other places. After the excess sugar has been removed into the “repositories”, the blood sugar level decreases and the person feels hungry again.

A persistent increase in blood sugar levels can cause the pancreas to stop producing enough insulin. With a lack of insulin, sugar fills the blood, causing diabetes. If the patient does not adhere to a diet and does not control the amount of sugar eaten, the consequences can be the most severe, up to diabetic coma and death.

Considering the question of the benefits and harms of sugar, it must be noted that, despite the fear of the threat of diabetes, this sweet product is sometimes called the “joy vitamin”. When brain cells are significantly deficient in glucose, moderate sugar consumption will effectively increase performance, actively reduce fatigue and bad mood, and reduce headaches. At the same time, this sweet product is the main cause of calcium burning, great amount which is spent on the absorption of refined sugar. As a result, acid rises in the oral cavity, pathogenic bacteria develop, which leads to dental caries. This is considered an important factor when discussing the benefits and harms of sugar.

Excessive consumption of sugar leads to an imbalance of amino acids diet, because when refining this sweet product, almost all the mineral salts necessary for the human body are removed. This causes a metabolic disorder that contributes to obesity, serious diseases of the endocrine glands, blood, and brain. And the B vitamins removed during sugar refining significantly increase the risk of mental and nervous diseases, polyneuritis.

But still, sweets are everywhere heavily promoted and advertised. Manufacturers of sweets, chocolate, caramel, soft drinks are extremely interested in selling them. Therefore, sugar is quite closely connected with the financial interests of many countries of the world. If you are not able to fight your own weakness, then replace the usual sugar with bee honey or marmalade, which will bring tangible benefits to your body. And it’s better to lean on fruits and dried fruits, because fructose is much more useful, talking about the benefits and harms of sugar. Try to lead an active lifestyle, find other sources of pleasure, then you will be less drawn to sweets.

So how much is Sahara Do you need to eat to keep fit? Scientists around the world have been trying to answer this question for many, many years. And only in April 2003, the most authoritative World Health Organization issued its verdict. According to pundits representing the Organization, a healthy person with sugar should not exceed 10% of calories from daily ration. If you translate grams into pieces of refined sugar, it will come out quite decently - 10-12 pieces.

But the point is that in daily allowance includes not only sugar, which we add to tea, coffee or porridge, but also the sugars contained in the rest of the food we eat. Meanwhile, a can of carbonated drink, for example, can contain about 40 grams of sugar! After drinking such a jar during the day and drinking sweet coffee with milk in the morning, we already exceed the quota in terms of Sahara. But what if we are offered a cake at work, but it is inconvenient to refuse? That's it.

Tireless Americans have calculated that the average US citizen gets about 190 grams of sugar per day from food. This is an excess of the permissible norm by 3 times. As for the average Russian, then, according to Soyuzrossahar, on average, only in its pure form (sand and refined sugar) eats 100 g per day. Can you imagine?

Firstly, it was found that sugar substitutes, although not as high in calories as simple sugar, but significantly increases appetite. Thus, the person still begins to gain weight. Secondly, in a large number they should not be consumed at all, as this can result in indigestion.

And finally, many doctors believe that sugar substitutes are, in principle, harmful to the human body. So, in many countries, the sugar substitute cyclomate (30 times sweeter than sugar) is banned for consumption, as scientists fear that it can cause kidney failure. Other sweeteners have also been repeatedly accused of being harmful - some doctors, for example, believe that saccharin has carcinogenic properties. However, no hypothesis has yet been proven.

Is it true that now sugar is less sweet than before?

With the advent of sugar produced from raw sugar on the Russian food market, there is an opinion among buyers that raw cane sugar is less sweet than beet sugar. This opinion is erroneous and completely unfounded.

Commercial granulated sugar produced at sugar factories from raw cane and sugar beets meets the requirements of one State Standard. Both of them are a product with the same content (at least 99.75%) of the same chemical compound - sucrose.

The same chemical compound has quite definite physical and chemical properties, regardless of origin. Therefore, solutions of cane and beet sugar that are identical in concentration, i.e. solutions of equal concentrations of sucrose cannot have different properties, in particular, different sweetness. So the sweetness of tea does not depend on the type of raw material from which the sugar is made, but on the number of spoons of sugar that you put in it.

Although there is another opinion:

Sugar is the common name for sucrose, which refers to water-soluble carbohydrates - valuable nutrients that provide the body with the energy it needs. The sucrose for the product called "sugar" is extracted from the juice of sugar beet and sugar cane. Is beet sugar different from cane sugar? If we are talking about white sugar that we are used to, and not about brown sugar, then no. The final product as a result of technological operations loses any taste differences.

In addition to sucrose, natural sugars also include fructose (found in fruits and honey), maltose (found in germinated grains, also called malt sugar), glucose (often called grape sugar, but found in honey, fruits and vegetables) and lactose ( milk sugar).

As a rule, two main types of sugar go on sale: regular and refined. We are accustomed to call refined sugar in the form of cubes, but granulated sugar can also be refined. Refined is the designation of the product of the highest purification, superior in quality to ordinary sugar. In Russia, there are now two regulatory documents that regulate the requirements for product quality: GOST 21-94 for granulated sugar and GOST 22-94 for refined sugar.

Distinctive features of a product called "granulated sugar" - increased content impurities: coloring, mineral and other substances. Impurities cause the color of the sand and a reduced degree of sweetness compared to refined sugar. Variety of granulated sugar powdered sugar, these are crushed crystals of granulated sugar with a size of not more than 0.2 mm.

Refined sugar, unlike sand, contains fewer impurities removed during refining. It is sweeter, although, to be honest, this difference is not dramatic. But the color of refined sugar differs from the color of granulated sugar - it is pure white, without impurities, a bluish tint is allowed.

sources

http://www.kristall-centr.irnd.ru

http://dobrakhata.ua

http://www.ja-zdorov.ru

http://polzavred.ru

http://sladov.ua

http://www.zooeco.com

I also recommend that you find out The original article is on the website InfoGlaz.rf Link to the article from which this copy is made -

Its homeland is India, where sweet grains were obtained from the juice of some varieties of reed, which later became known as sugar.

Indian sugar was well known in Ancient Rome. A sweet delicacy was brought to the Eternal City through the territory of Egypt, which for quite a long time was part of the empire. Already closer to the sunset of Rome, sugar cane began to be cultivated in Sicily and in some regions of Southern Spain, but after the collapse of the empire, the cultivation of sugar cane did not receive further development.

Sugar was first brought to Russia around the 11th - 12th century. At that time, it cost absolutely incredible money and only the prince and his entourage could try it. However, over time, overseas sweets fell somewhat in price, and under Peter the Great, a "sugar chamber" appeared in Russia: they organized the import of raw materials from abroad and the production of sugar on the spot.

Since 1809, a new stage began in the fate of sugar in Russia - work began on establishing the production of sugar from domestic raw materials. In this capacity, sugar beets acted.

Raw sugar

The oldest source of sugar is sugar cane. For the first time it began to be consciously cultivated in the Persian Gulf, from where it gradually spread first to Europe, and then to America.

By the time sugar cane came to the Americas, sugar was already being consumed in Europe very actively, and therefore its mass cultivation began, especially since the climate was very favorable for this. Attempts to cultivate cane in Europe gradually faded away: American sugar was, oddly enough, much cheaper.

It was only under Napoleon that they thought about getting sugar from the long-familiar and familiar beets. When almost all of continental Europe, except for Great Britain, was under his control, Napoleon decided to arrange a commercial blockade for the British. But he didn’t take into account (or, on the contrary, perfectly understood) that almost all the sugar that got to Europe was brought by merchant ships of the British fleet.

In order not to be completely without sugar, I had to look for its alternative sources. It turned out that beetroot fits perfectly, and even almost nothing had to be invented. Old work came in handy.

The history of these developments is as follows. In 1747, Andreas Marggraf found out that sugar, which had previously been obtained from sugar cane, was also found in beets. After a series of experiments, the scientist was able to determine that the sugar content in fodder beet is 1.3%. Breeders decided to increase this percentage and started breeding a special, sugar beet. To date, they have succeeded in this so much that varieties of modern beets already contain more than 20% of the required sugar.

Until 1801, all these discoveries were not in demand, and then one of Marggraf's students, whose name was Franz Karl Achard, devoted his life to the problem of obtaining beet sugar. It was he who, back in 1801, equipped the first factory in Europe for processing beets for sugar in Lower Silesia. In general, in 1807, when Napoleon set up a trade blockade, Europe was not left without sugar.

Raw material processing and sugar production

To get sugar from cane, do the following:

• The stems are cut before they bloom. They contain up to 8-12% fiber, 18-21% sugar and 67-73% water (salts and proteins).
• Then the cut stems are crushed with iron shafts and the juice is squeezed out of them. The juice contains up to 18.36% sugar, 81% water and a very small amount of aromatic substances that give raw juice peculiar smell.
• Freshly slaked lime is added to raw juice. This is done to separate proteins. The resulting mixture is heated to 70°C, then filtered and evaporated until the sugar crystallizes.

Getting sugar from beets takes much more time and effort. Today the technology is:

• The beets collected in the fields are accumulated at special sites - kagat storages, where they are kept for quite a long time - up to three months.
• After storage, the root crops are washed and processed into shavings.
• Then, diffusion juice is obtained from beet chips with hot water (+75°C).
• The juice goes through several stages of purification. It uses calcium hydroxide and carbon dioxide.
• The purified juice is boiled down to a syrup with a solids concentration of 55-65%, then it is discolored with sulfur oxide and filtered.
• From the syrup in the vacuum apparatus of the 1st stage, a massecuite of the 1st crystallization (7.5% of water) is obtained, which is centrifuged, removing the "white" molasses. The crystals remaining on the centrifuge sieves are washed, dried, and packaged.
• "White" molasses is thickened again in the vacuum apparatus of the 2nd stage and divided into "green" molasses and "yellow" sugar of the 2nd product, which, after dissolving in pure water, is added to the syrup entering the vacuum apparatus 1- oh steps.
• For additional extraction of sugar, a 3-stage boiling and desugaring is sometimes used.
• The molasses obtained at the last stage of crystallization is molasses - a waste of sugar production, which contains 40-50% sucrose and by weight is 4-5% of the mass of processed beets.

To date, the leader in the cultivation of sugar beet is Ukraine, followed by Russia and Belarus. Then - the EU countries and regions of North and Central America with a temperate climate.

Types of sugar

Types of sugar are distinguished by the plant from which it is obtained. In addition to cane and beet sugars, there are three more types:

• Maple. It has been produced in the eastern provinces of Canada since the 17th century from the sap of the sugar maple. The volumes of extraction are impressive: up to 3-6 pounds of sugar are "filtered" from each tree annually.
• Palm. This type of sugar is very common in South and Southeast Asia, the Moluccas and many islands of the Indian Ocean. Here it is often called jagre, but is obtained from sweet juice from cuts on young flower cobs of various types of palms, including coconut and date palms.
• Sorghum. It is obtained from the stalks of sugar sorghum. Moreover, the technology was first developed in China in ancient times.

By the way. Refined sugar (the one in the form of cubes) was invented in 1843 in the Czech Republic. This brilliant idea came to the Swiss Jakov Christoph Radu, who worked as a manager at a sugar factory in Dačica. Today, at the place where this plant was located, there is a monument - a snow-white cube, symbolizing refined sugar.

• Great Soviet Encyclopedia
• Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron
• Free electronic encyclopedia Wikipedia, section "Sugarcane".
• Free electronic encyclopedia Wikipedia, section "Sugar beet".
• Shorin P.M. Technology of cultivation and use of sugar sorghum.