White spots in dark brown sugar

[snowbeard]

Hey y'all. I hope this is the right place to ask this.
I noticed some white regions in my dark brown sugar. It doesn't look like mold or a foreign substance. The sugar granules just look... very, very light colored. I'd like to take a high-res pic to show but I can't find a good camera.

Is this mold? I didn't think mold could grow in sugar because of the moisture absorption.
Thanks.

[escondido123]

My brown sugar often has white spots. Same has been true for the 40 years I've been baking. Nothing to worry about.

[lcool]

sugar is significantly anti-microbial....don't think mold

Sugar is a modified liquid,it melts easily,so the darker,more liquid migrated leaving pale spots.

The homoginization of almost anything is imperfect at best.

Your white spots could be the result of nothing other than temperature changes,repeatedly shipment,storage places,the store itself or even in the home.

[babette feasts]

Sometimes brown sugar is not actually the less refined version of white, but white sugar mixed with molasses. If I run out of brown, I'll add 10 to 15% molasses by weight and mix in the kitchenaid. I actually worked for a guy who thought buying brown sugar was a waste of time, so I had to mix it in batches if I wanted to keep it around.

So maybe you just got some sugar that wasn't very well mixed.

[greygarious]

I agree - it's either unevenly-mixed, or the molasses has settled and left whiter sugar on top, both of which I have seen in the brown sugar I buy.

[Kelli2006]

I once had to improvise brown sugar when I ran out of brown sugar with 1 cup of white sugar and 1TBL of slightly warmed molasses in a food processor. If you want to make bakers sugar, you need to puree the white sugar for 30 seconds before adding the molasses.

I received many compliments on that pastry that I now prefer to make my own. It uses up the bottle of molasses that we all seem to have in the pantry.

[Manassas64]

I always buy Domino, so I've never run into white spots. But I notice when I go to family members houses who buy store brand that they have a lot of white in them. I assume it's just a processing thing and Domino has the process down a little finer.

It's still good & sweet :D

[scubadoo97]

I agree with you but would say most of the time brown sugar is white sugar with molasses added.