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sorghum molasses or sorghum syrup or sometimes just plain sorghum.
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    Molasses and Ginger: A Classic Combination
     
    Molasses Gingerbread Cake
     
E ver since colonial times, Americans have paired the sweet/bitter flavor of molasses with ginger and other spices. This dark, dense, and moist cake is good plain or dressed up with whipped cream. Cooks who avoid dairy products can substitute ¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons light-flavored olive oil for the butter. The strong flavors of ginger and molasses will make the switch undetectable.
     
     
2½ cups all-purpose flour
1½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup (1 stick) butter, melted and slightly cooled
½ cup sugar
1 large egg
1 cup dark unsulphured molasses
1 cup hot (not boiling) water
     
     
1. Adjust the oven rack to the middle position. Spray an 8-by 8-inch pan with nonstick cooking spray. Preheat the oven to 350ºF for a metal pan or 325ºF if using an ovenproof glass pan.
 
     
2. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and salt with a wooden spoon. In a large bowl, whisk together the melted butter, sugar, and egg. In a small bowl or glass measure, stir the molasses into the hot water until completely blended.
 
     
3. Add about one-third of the flour mixture to the butter-sugar-egg mixture and whisk together just to moisten the ingredients. Then whisk in about half of the molasses mixture. Continue by adding another third of the flour mixture, then the other half of the molasses mixture, then the final third of the flour mixture. Whisk just until all the patches of white disappear. Do not overmix.
 
     
4. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 50 to 55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean and the cake has pulled away somewhat from the sides of the pan. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes.
 
     
5. Serve warm from the pan, or turn the cake out onto a rack to cool. This is a good keeper and will stay fresh for several days, covered, at room temperature.
 
     
    MAKES 9 TO 12 SERVINGS
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    A TIGHT SQUEEZE?
     
    My recipe for fondant tells me to dissolve two cups of sugar in one cup of water. It won’t fit, will it?
     
    W hy didn’t you try it?
    Add two cups of sugar to one cup of water in a saucepan and stir while heating slightly. You’ll see that all the sugar will dissolve.
    One of the reasons is very simple: Sugar molecules can squeeze into empty spaces between the water molecules, so they are not really taking up much new space. When you get right down to the submicroscopic level, water isn’t a densely packed pile of molecules. It’s a somewhat open latticework, with the molecules connected to one another in tangled strings. The holes in this latticework can accommodate a surprising number of dissolved particles. This is especially true of sugar, because sugar molecules are built in such a way that they just love to associate with (Techspeak: hydrogen-bond to) water molecules, and that makes sugar very mixable with water. As a matter of fact, with heating, you can coax more than two pounds (5 cups!) of sugar to dissolve in a single cup of water. Of course, by the time you get that far, it’s not clear whether you’re dealing with a boiling solution of sugar in water or with bubbling melted sugar containing a little water.

     
A snapshot of the arrangement of H 2 O molecules in water. The dashed lines represent hydrogen bonds, which are continually breaking and re-forming between molecules.
     
    And that’s how candy was born.
    Yet another reason is that two cups of sugar is considerably less sugar than it seems. Sugar molecules are both heavier and bulkier than water molecules, so there won’t be as many of them in a pound or in a cup. Also, the sugar is in granulated form, rather than in the form of a liquid, and the grains don’t settle down into the cup as tightly as you might