Sweet sorghum syrup is a dark, molasses-like sweetener made by pressing the juice from the stalks of sweet sorghum, a warm-climate crop with a 100-120 day season, and boiling it down to about 230 F; the sugar guide puts the yield at 100-200 gallons of syrup per acre. It suits warm temperate to subtropical climates where maple does not grow, and the pressed stalks make animal feed.
Sorghum syrup is a thick sweetener made by crushing the stalks of sweet sorghum varieties and evaporating the juice.
A Crop-Based Sweetener For Warm Climates
The sugar guide describes sweet sorghum as growing in warm temperate to subtropical climates where maple does not thrive, producing a dark flavourful syrup comparable to molasses. The production sequence is: grow sweet sorghum (specific varieties, not grain sorghum); harvest the stalks in fall when the seed heads mature and strip the leaves; press the stalks through a roller mill (a three-roller press is traditional) to extract juice; boil the juice in a long shallow evaporator pan, skimming foam continuously; cook to 230 F for proper syrup consistency; jar hot for storage. It claims a yield of 100-200 gallons per acre and says that the advantage over sugar beets is a higher yield per acre of usable sweetener, simpler processing, and stalks that feed animals after pressing.
The pages below cover Sweet Sorghum Cultivation, Pressing and Boiling and Yield and Labor Requirements.
A Claim To Check
The comparison with beets depends on the beet figure of 200-300 lb of sugar per acre, which the beet pages show does not follow from the guide’s own beet yield and sugar content (Yield per Acre). At 100-200 gallons, sorghum gives roughly 1,150-2,300 lb of syrup per acre (a gallon of syrup weighing about 11.5 lb, taking its density as 1.38 kg per litre, a recalled value), which is about the same order as the beet scenarios of 1,080-5,000 lb of sugar. So “higher yield per acre” holds against the guide’s beet number but not necessarily against a properly derived one.
What You Need
- Sweet sorghum seed, of a sweet variety, not grain sorghum
- Warm ground and a 100-120 day season
- A roller mill to press the stalks
- A long shallow evaporator pan and plenty of dry wood
- A calibrated thermometer, filters and jars
Method: From Field To Jar, In Outline
Step 1: Plant after the last frost. Step 2: Harvest the stalks in fall when the seed heads mature; strip the leaves. Step 3: Press the stalks for juice. Step 4: Boil in a shallow pan, skimming, to the finishing temperature. Step 5: Jar hot.
Common Mistakes
- Planting grain sorghum. It does not give a sweet juice.
- Pressing before the pan and fuel are ready. The guide gives no holding time for juice, so have the evaporator lit first.
- Forgetting the wood. Evaporating the juice takes less fuel per gallon than maple, but still a large amount (see the pressing page).
Safety
Boiling syrup, and sorghum can poison livestock
Hot syrup sticks to skin and scalds worse than boiling water; keep children away from the pan and cool burns under running water at once (Thermal Injury Care). Young, frost-damaged or drought-stressed sorghum plants can contain compounds that release cyanide when eaten (recalled agricultural knowledge, not from this corpus), so do not graze or feed animals young regrowth or stressed plants without advice.
What’s Next
- Learn next: Sweet Sorghum Cultivation — growing the crop
- Combine with: Maple Syrup Production — the cold-climate alternative