42 Condensed Milk and Milk Powder 



There is no good reason why the best refined beet sugar, manu- 

 factured today in this country and elsewhere, should not give fully 

 as good results for condensing purposes, as the same quality of cane 

 sugar. Tests made at the California Agricultural Experiment Sta- 

 tion 1 led to the conclusion that the two kinds of sugar, cane sugar 

 and beet sugar, were equally valuable for canning and identical in 

 their behavior when of the same fineness of crystallization. 



Beet Sugar Cannot be Detected From Cane Sugar. — While 

 the raw sugar from the two different sources, the sugar cane and 

 the sugar beet, takes on the character of the impurities from which 

 it has not yet been freed (the raw product of the sugar cane is 

 pleasant in flavor, the raw product from the sugar beet is acrid and 

 disagreeable in flavor), the sucrose or so-called pure cane sugar, 

 can be and 1 is crystallized out, and in every case the sugar is identical 

 in chemical composition, appearance and properties. "By no chem- 

 ical test can the pure crystallized sugar from these two different 

 sources be distinguished." 2 



4 



Quality of the Sugar. — Since the sugar, sucrose, is added for 

 the purpose of preserving the condensed milk, it is obvious that none 

 but the best quality of refined sucrose is admissible. Low grade 

 sucrose is a product dangerous to the condensed milk business. It 

 is apt to contain sufficient quantities of acid and invert sugar, to give 

 'bacteria and yeast an opportunity to start fermentation. When 

 once started, the destruction of the product is almost inevitable. In 

 years of failure of the sugar cane crop, when the prices of sucrose 

 soar high, condenseries yield frequently to the temptation of buying 

 lower grades of sugar. The result invariably is an abnormally large 

 output of condensed milk that "goes wrong." 



It is very important that the sugar in the factory be stored 

 where it will keep dry. Sucrose has hygroscopic properties. When 

 exposed to an atmosphere saturated with moisture it absorbs water. 

 In damp storage it is prone to become lumpy, moldy and frequently 

 sour. When these precautions are neglected there is danger of de- 

 fective condensed milk, causing the cans on the market to swell, due 

 to gaseous fermentation. 



1 California Agricultural Experiment Station, Circular No. 33 



2 United States Department of Agriculture, Farmers' Bulletin No. 535, 1913 



