3 



After tho addition of the lime the juice should be slowly heated to the boiling 

 point. It should not be boiled at this stage. The heat should be continued until 

 the blanket of scum shows signs of breaking in several places. The heating should 

 then be discontinued and the blanket of scuin be removed by a suitable skimmer. 

 The juice should now be boiled briskly, the scum being brushed off as fast as it rises 

 to the surface. It is well to examine a test sample of the juice in a small bottle after 

 brushing. The particles of suspended flocculent matter should move rapidly; those 

 near the sides of the bottle rising nearly to the surface and descending at the cen- 

 tral part formiug a cone-shaped deposit. The juice between these particles should 

 be bright and of an amber color. 



To obtain the conditions described above requires skill and patience, butitmust 

 be remembered that a bright sirup of good flavor can be made only from bright, well 

 clarified juice. An excellent sirup may be made by adding a little bisulphite of lime 

 in the above process. This bisulphite is made by passing the fumes of burning sul- 

 phur, to saturation, into cream of lime. 



Returning to the clarification after the juice has been boiled and thoroughly 

 brushed, the heat should be withdrawn and the suspended matter permitted to 

 settle. After settling as long as necessary, usually from one to two hours, the clear 

 juice should be drawn off and evaporated very rapidly to a sirup. The skimmings 

 should be settled and the clear juice decanted. The residue should be treated with 

 water, settled, and the diluted juice drawn off. The drainings from the skimmings 

 should be added to the fresh juice from the mill. 



Some form of continuous evaporator based on the old-fashioned apparatus of Cook is 

 best adapted to sorghum work. The juice constantly runs in at one end of the 

 evaporator, passes back and forth across it, and finally the finished sirup runs out at 

 the other end. The evaporation should be as rapid as possible. The sirup should 

 be cooled rapidly. 



If the sirup shows a tendency to granulate, the cane should be cut three or four 

 days before it is to be worked and allowed to lie in the fields. If tht^e is no ten- 

 dency to granulation the cane should be worked immediately after harvesting. 



A fairly good article of sirup can be made without the use of lime. Sirup mad<- 

 in this way always retains much of the rank flavor of the sorghum. Tt is excep- 

 tionally good, however, for baking purposes. 



Sorghum sirup is made in every State of the Union and on thou- 

 sands of small mills. When carefully made it is wholesome and pala- 

 table. Unless the utmost care and cleanliness are exercised by the 

 maker, there is no process which will produce a good article, attractive 

 to the consumer. If, however, the above principles are observed, care, 

 attention, and experience on the part of the maker will give a good 

 article of sirup, suited for use on the table and in the kitchen. 



G. L. SPENCER, 

 First Assistant Chemist. 

 Approved : 



GHAS. W. DABNEY, JR., 



Assistant Secretary, 

 WASHINGTON, D. C., July 15, 1894. 





