SELECTION AND PREPARATION OF SUGAR AND JAGGERY AND THEIR NUTRITIVE VALUE

 You would have enjoyed eating sweet preparations like burfi, gulabjamuns, rasgullas, ice-creams. These sweets and desserts form an important part of any feast or social functions like birthdays or marriages. All these preparations have sugar as an ingredient. Your tea, coffee, soft drinks and other beverages, also contain sugar. The main sweetening agent all over the world is sugar. This is made from sugarcane or sugarbeets. In our country sugarcane is used for making sugar, while in European countries, especially West Germany, sugar beets are used. Which ever source is used for the production of sugar, the product obtained is the same.

Our country is one of the largest producers of sugar. Sugar is produced from sugarcane in the factories. In brief the process of making sugar is: the sugarcane is crushed. The juice so obtained has some impurities. It is then refined and concentrated to form sugar crystals. In our villages even now a large quantity of sugarcane is used to produce jaggery or gur. It is prepared by farmers at home or in fields. While making jaggery, sugarcane juice is boiled and concentrated in large iron pans. The concentrated mixture is then well stirred and allowed to set into a solid mass. Although jaggery is produced from the same sugarcane it has a brown colour because it is not refined to the same degree as sugar. In India our combined daily intake of sugar and jaggery per person ranges from 10-30 grams or 2-6 teaspoons.

Honey is another sweetening agent. It is derived from flowers. It is popular for its taste and flavour through the agency of honey bees. Sometimes it is used as a medicine. However, its availability is limited and cost is quite high.

Sugar and jaggery provide us calories. Jaggery, in addition, provides calcium, iron and vitamin B-complex. Encourage use of jaggery in our traditional dishes. Sugar is sweet and is enjoyed by us. However, excessive intake of sugar is harmful. It can lead to dental caries, obesity and other related diseases. Diabetics is one of them.

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