Liquid Molasses from Dry?

haw · Joined: 25 May 2003 Posts: 8 Location: Colleyville

Is it possible to take some of my dry molasses and turn it into the liquid kind that goes into several of the organic tea recipes? If so, how? If not, what's the difference between the liquid and the dry varieties I've purchased in the past?

Thanks,
Adam

CaptainCompostAL · Joined: 10 Mar 2003 Posts: 870 Location: Irondale,Alabama

I buy dry molasses powder from my local farm feed supply store in 50 lb bags for around $10.00 here in my area. They sell it and think it is a cattle feed supplement. We know it's a powerful fertilizer, soil amendment, and biostimulant.

This is my understanding that I received from an expert that works at one of the factories that makes the stuff. Dry molasses powder is made by spraying and drying natural liquid molasses over old grain roughage waste material like soy, corn, wheat, or oat flour.

Since liquid molasses is a carbohydrate high in carbon, it gives all microbes a lot of quick energy to survive and stay alive longer. Brown sugar also contains some beneficial molasses in it, even though it is not that great of quality as natural liquid molasses.

Dry molasses is more than that. It contains NPK and lots of micronutrients, because of the grain flour mixed in it.

Another great product that I love is cheap pelletized or whole grain cattle feeds. They all contain a lot of molasses and proteins in it. The pelletize style I use straight as a soil amendment in my garden or lawn. The whole grain style I use in my tea brewing or composting, to prevent sprouting problems in my garden. The only exception is when it is cover cropping time, then the grain sprouting is a great plus to my soil and soil organisms.

I love dry molasses powder! I use it now in almost everything in the garden or lawn.

Guest · Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2003 3:59 pm Post subject:

I am not sure if I understand it all.
So is dry convertable to liquid?

khwoz · Joined: 10 May 2003 Posts: 778 Location: Weatherford,TX

It would take a lot of work to extract the molasses from the dry mix; it would not be worth the effort! Use it as dry and if you want liquid to spray, buy liquid. As the Captain said, the liquid is sprayed over a grain material. If you soaked it in water to extract the molasses, you would also extract the grain juice. This would make a compost tea of sorts & would be ok to use. Don't know why you want to do this ???

Guest · Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2003 5:11 pm Post subject: Re: molasses

KHWOZ wrote: . Don't know why you want to do this ???
Primarily b/c I chose the horticulture field for the love and not the money.
I thought I would make use of extra and save the cash

Dchall_San_Antonio · Joined: 18 Mar 2003 Posts: 2001 Location: San Antonio,TEXAS

I'm just guessing but I think that a 50 pound bag of dried molasses contains 49 pounds of corn cobs and 1 pound of actual molasses. If you want to save a LOT of money, find a farm and ranch co-op that sells molasses by the pound. The current price is around $0.10 per pound. A gallon weighs 10.5 pounds. You have to provide the bottles or 55-gallon drums.

Enzyme11 · Joined: 06 Apr 2003 Posts: 277

David and KHWOZ are correct -- it would be much more expensive and inefficient to extract liquid molasses from the very diluted dry molasses product, and it would not be particularly easy to get a good yield. If you need liquid molasses, it's best to buy it as liquid (unless of course you have an abundance of inexpensive dry product that you don't know what to do with). If you need a liquid sugar source and can't get liquid molasses, consider sugar, corn syrup, or fruit juice such as watermelon juice, depending of course on what your need is in relation to the dominant type of sugar in the source and the price/availability. For a soporific discourse about molasses, see the discussion on the Livestock and Ranching forum called "Molasses From Feed Store OK?."

If you prefer to avoid the very energy intensive and environmentally damaging commercial sugar production process, you might want to consider making your own sugar for your horticultural applications. The grain/diastase combination that begins the beer brewing process and/or the gasohol ethanol production process are simple places to start. The process's enzyme kinetics escapes my memory at the moment, but there probably is plenty of discussion on the Web if you're interested in that aspect of it. 8)