Hi Karen!

I have managed to work my around most restricted inredients by finding something else to replace it, but molasses has me at a loss as to what to use in its place. It's kind of a singular flavor.
Do you know of anything that can be used or that you've tried as a molasses substitute?
Thanks!
Sue

I use instant coffee substitute. Something made with chicory or barley in conjunction with artificial sweetener comes close to the taste.

Karen

depends on the recipe....
In some recipes I actually do use a small amount of real mollases, making sure to use the darkest and most flavorful I can find.....so that I use less that the recipe calls for to drasticly cut down the carb count. Sometimes I use brown canadian sugar twin in small amounts for some things...though if you use to much it just tastes bad....

I did well making bbq sauce not using molasses at all. I compensated for it with other flavors.
In times past I would have used it a lot in making baked beans, but since beans are such an infrequent thing for me (I haven't had baked beans at all since going low carb, and I had garbanzos maybe 2x in something, but otherwise no) beans haven't been a problem. If I did make them, there are other ways besides using molasses.
I really have been thinking ahead (holidays?) and gingerbread has been on my mind to have in some form or another. But as might be expected, molasses is a BIG player there. I came across some Da Vinci sugar free gingerbread syrup. I have had the full sugar version in times past for lattes, etc. I think it could add plenty of flavor in certain recipes. I can't recall if it was overly "spicy" tasting but will see when I get it to find out if it is good for other things.

I had thought of barley and barley malt but they do have a bit of carbs. Anything, I think, done to barley to bring out that flavor would also increase the carbs as well. Not sure if it would make it worse than some molasses by then.
I haven't tried chicory or coffee but that might be a great idea for beans. Coffee and bourbon together particularly strikes my interest there.
Thanks for the ideas!
I think I have several things I could try now.

i don't think it's instant coffee;



that might make a difference in taste if you use instant coffee

I use molasses if the amount is small and it is used more as a flavoring than a sweetener.

I took Karen's suggestion of chicory coffee sub (powdered version from my health food shop) and used it to vary a LC spice bread recipe that I make to get what we call 'Treacle bread' here. I added some coffee essence and some cocoa to get the dark rich taste that I knew and loved and it was WONDERFUL! Yummy! Even fooled DH
Thanks for the idea, Karen.
Babs

I use Organic Black Strap Molasses, which has great natural iron in it and only 13 carbs per Tablespoon (the low carb count of any Molasses). It is REALLY strong, much stronger than other types of Molasses. For me 1 Tbsp is usually enough for an entire recipe of whatever it I need. For example, if you are making 3 cups of BBQ sauce that is going to be used on an entire chicken or rib its not a lot of carbs per person.

A trick that is in Dana Carpenter's 500 Low Carb Recipes is to use Black Strap Molasses and Splenda as a substitution for brown sugar. It works great. I use just ½ teaspoon of Blackstrap Molasses with 2 or 3 tablespoons Splenda, it really works well for things you just have to have brown sugar molasses flavor, for example a low carb oat bran muffin has to have this flavor to make it taste right.

I bought a bottle a year ago and still have over half of it because I use so little of it. I keep it in the fridge.

I can speak to the DaVinci; I must say, I think their Gingerbread flavour is mild and the spice flavours just don't come through very strongly, and the molasses flavour is just not a strong note in there. I stick to the 'pumpkin pie spice blend' for those flavours when I need them.

On the other hand, their new Spice Blend flavour has considerably more spiciness and character, and would be more useful though still the flavour would need boosting unless you used a tremendous lot. Of course, a little tiny bit of real molasses works well to do that boosting. I have an ancient carton the the blackstrap, it seems to keep forever and a very small amount does a tremendous job.

Although, I just have to try the coffee sub (roasted chicory root usually) with coffee and cocoa combo, that sounds like fun and a cool experiment!

I agree, Kelrivas, a bit of Dark or Blackstrap Molasses doesn't have many carbs and it packs a super-powerful flavor.

Could i make a syrup by using Black Strap Molasses and adding water? Let it dissolve in the water and using it like you would Davinci SF syrups?

Would it spoil? Ferment?







deb

What do you want to use it for? Thinned out blackstrap molasses doesn't sound that, umm, appealing?

Karen

Deb, if I were going to do that I would do it just before using so you don't have to worry about leftovers.

I wanted to mention that I found some molasses syrup online made with Splenda. It's hard to say whether it will be good or nasty, but I ordered a small one. I will let you know if I survive the taste test.
Here is the url if anyone else is interested:
http://www.naturesflavors.com
I also got some pumpkin syrup. I was thinking of trying to make muffins with that. My luck it will probably smell like a scented candle instead of food. *yikes*!
Will let you know on that one too.
~sue

i like the molasses flavour to put in stir frys and in LC BBQ sauce..

Would it be better to just put in a tiny amount of the Blackstrap Molasses?


deb