Molasses Bar Day

What the day is

Molasses Bar Day is observed on February 8. The bar in question is an old-fashioned tray bake: a soft, dense, spiced square made with molasses, usually cut from a single pan and often iced or dusted with sugar.

It belongs to the same family as gingerbread and molasses cookies, and it is deliberately plain. The appeal is the flavor of the sweetener itself, which is bitter, mineral and slightly smoky in a way refined sugar is not.

Origin and background

The origin of the observance is not documented.

Molasses is what remains after sucrose is crystallized out of cane or beet juice, and it comes in grades. The first boiling gives a light, mild syrup; the second gives a darker, stronger one; the third gives blackstrap, which is thick, bitter and only lightly sweet. Most baking recipes assume unsulphured dark molasses, and using blackstrap in its place will make a noticeably harsh result.

It was the default sweetener in much of colonial and nineteenth-century America because it was far cheaper than refined sugar, arriving from Caribbean plantations as part of a trade in which enslaved labor produced the cane. That history is part of the ingredient and is worth stating plainly. Molasses also fed the rum distilleries of New England, which is why colonial baking and colonial drinking share a base ingredient.

Its use declined as refined sugar became cheap, and it survives now mainly in baked goods where its flavor is the point, along with baked beans and barbecue sauces.

How to take part

• Check which molasses you have. Dark unsulphured is the general-purpose choice; blackstrap is a different ingredient.
• Grease the measuring cup or spoon first, or oil it lightly, and the molasses will slide out instead of clinging.
• Do not cut the baking soda. Molasses is acidic and the soda is there to react with it as much as to leaven.
• Underbake slightly. Molasses bars firm up considerably as they cool, and a fully baked pan turns hard.
• Let them sit a day. The spice flavor deepens overnight and the texture improves.