[David]

When I made the Quebecois Baked Beans a month or so ago I had to buy some good ol' molasses---and thinking about it----this was the first time I had ever purchased molasses! Molasses was a commonplace item in the cupboards of my grandmothers and features somewhat in the settling of the west in North America. But who uses molasses anymore? And how do you use it? In Atlantic Canada fresh bread dipped in molasses is apparently still a common food item but what about in your area? My friend Ben, an Acadian, talks of molasses and peanut butter sandwiches as a staple of his youth--how about yours? I remember molasses cookies, and fresh bread doused in fresh farm cream then covered in molasses---but not much else.
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Vivant Linguae Mortuae!!

[KYHeirloomer]

Molassas, per se, seems to be more of a northern thing, David.

Although I use if quite frequently, in things like barbecue sauces and some baked goods (it really puts the pump in pumpernickle, for instance), as you move south molassas is displaced by both sorgum syrup and, in the deep south, cane syrup.

In the saying, "the biscuits and the syrup never come out even," sorgum is the syrup being referred to.

BTW, in colonial times, a form of molassas was made from pumpkins, which are very rich in natural sugars. This, too, seems to have been more of a New England and Canadian thing, as pumpkins were often served as supper in the South.

[Griffin]

My dad always uses molasses in cakes. I've never had it with peanut butter tho'... Raspberry jam and peanut butter definitely. Now I'm going to have to try the Ben bread and butter!

I didn't know you could make molasses from pumpkins, that's a new one on me! I'll have to look up more on that one. They can be sweet in pumpkin pie tho' so it does make a lot of sense now that you say that. Ta for that.
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Confusion comes fitted as standard.