The holidays are just around the corner, and professional bakers around the globe are prepping their kitchens to create the perfect culinary delights for their customers. From baklava for Hanukkah to chocolate fruit cake for Kwanzaa, winter months are resplendent in delicious desserts. At Bell Chem, your food ingredient distributor, we want to go over different varieties of sugar and explain how each one can enhance holiday baking in an industrial kitchen. 

• Brown sugar: Almost every professional baker stocks brown sugar and granulated sugar in their kitchens. How do these differ? Brown sugar is simply granulated sugar with molasses. Why would you add molasses to sugar? You don’t. Sugar sources naturally contain molasses, which is removed for refined sugars. Light brown sugar, not surprisingly, has less molasses per volume than dark brown sugar.

• Granulated sugar: Granulated sugar has various sized grains (both words are derived from the Latin granum) that can mean the difference between confectioner’s sugar and turbinado (raw or unrefined) sugar.

Granulated sugar is 99.95% sucrose, whether it is derived from beets or sugarcane. This form is by far the most popular form used by professional bakers since it’s easy to use in all applications from main meat courses to desserts. Sugar is hygroscopic, meaning it tends to collect water, which keeps bakery items fresher longer. This fact is also handy when sugar is an ingredient in a sauce since it acts as a thickener, although sugar may clump when left on the shelf for an extended time. However, sugar, like salt and honey, does not spoil. 

Regardless of the variety, sugar decelerates the formation of gluten in wheat flour, causing goods to be softer, lighter, and have a more delicate texture.

• Confectioner’s sugar: Powdered sugar is the top ingredient in candy making and icings. Many baked goods are often dusted with confectioner’s sugar. Powdered sugar is rated 10X, 6X, XXX or XX, with 10X being ground to the finest consistency. While 10X will give foods (especially frostings) a creamy mouthfeel, it is often too fine-grained to dust atop baked goods since it dissolves. Confectioner’s sugar contains 3%-5% cornstarch to prevent clumping.

• Superfine sugar: Known as baker’s sugar, caster sugar, or ultrafine sugar, the grains are still crystalline, but not quite as finely ground as confectioner’s sugar. Superfine sugar dissolves more rapidly and gives baked goods a finer texture. 

• Raw granulated sugar: Also called turbinado or demerara sugar, raw sugars contain molasses, but are dry crystals rather than thick, clumpy brown sugar. Raw sugar adds texture and crunch to the top of baked goods, and is often added to hot or cold beverages.

• Decorative sugars: Many forms of sugar abound to decorate foods and beverages. Among these are sanding sugar and pearl sugar. Pearl sugar has large, opaque grains similar to salt while sanding sugar is shimmery and clear. 

Discover more about industrial baking ingredients by reading Bell Chem’s blog. Bell Chem is a food ingredient distributor based in Longwood, FL (just north of Orlando) with hundreds of products stocked in their 50,000+ square-foot warehouse, including many varieties of sugar. You can expect the highest quality products, expedited shipping options for maximum efficiency, and unrivaled personalized customer service. Let our knowledgeable and friendly customer service representatives and accounting staff personalize all your needs by either calling 407-339-BELL (2355) or by sending us an online message.