dean cornett - All about Molasses - from Cane Patch to Kitchen

worked all summer to grow corn to feed cattle all wet again Oh after he got dark this little boy and there were several kids there and we all played around [Music] in order to make molasses you need an awful lot of sugarcane like that in this field on JP Campbell's farm and Ave Kentucky take these mother Hope gave us numbers for earlier stir offs made 15 gallons of molest we also need an engine and transmission to drive the rollers that squeeze the cane and produce the Jews oh yeah yeah [Music] since the mill hasn't been used for a year or two it has to be washed out before you can but came to clear Randy is throwing water in the night mill until the outflow runs clear instead of dirty minute big cam in a gallon dude [Music] this machine is the handiwork of Jesse Campbell Randy Campbell and JP Campbell who bought built assembled and engineered it while Randy and others are feeding Cain into the mill JP is stealing a stock for a visitor tastes as the juice runs down into the bucket it runs through a strainer that catches solid pieces we restrain this into probably about that tool you're using that's part of a solid like that cut okay but is that now would that be kind of an imitation of something they might have used 200 years ago or I'm sorry yeah take a look at the back a knife to cut the back with oh yeah okay I noticed you mostly cut takeout strip off the leaves before you actually cut the cane but some of you do it differently right but it's easier is it if you get most of the leaves off yeah okay [Music] the first load of cane being backed up to the mill [Music] [Music] and the first stalks being fed into the mill like that [Music] I was told that the ratio is about ten to one juice to molasses [Music] [Laughter] here we hit you can this meal I don't know how old it is my cousin about it I'm short one time it was operated by with a moon and a poem you know and he bought it from the griffeys people online for they had a Honda front in a behind a car on the here for the transmission is no we use that for two or three years and they got where it wouldn't run tractor when we got the mail it didn't have these prophets on it either mix Prague he came up with a piece of mining equipment what both of the bigger the change that's how we now when you read in the days when you were using news how much of that would have been there if you were using news okay and it turned a lot slower for them you know so it would have taken a lot longer in the old dollars to process this much anyone took all day to do nothing goes to waste in this process JP will use this spent cane to march his berry patch before we start using the tractor we had a little old Honda engine and Honda Steve again we spent 30% of time squeezing pain and 70% working over tell me about smoke coming out you know just seals to paying off the mud drives and cracks and the yep go back over time seal it back up you know smoke how did you know how to do this well we just learned from old timers tell us what to do and how to do it mm-hmm something we always wanted to do growing up and never did get a chance course we'd go to stir office you know online people for everything and we just decided we'd do it me and JP my brother and Jess Campbell we've been doing it for several years just trial and error mostly [Music] it takes a hot fire to boil the water out of the juice [Music] a stir off isn't all business and work it's also a social event of tradition in these mountains for centuries hours of dipping and scooping and skimming this day there was as is the custom a feast of sauerkraut shucky bean soup beans onions tomatoes cornbread and peach and cherry compote you can bowl you boil it hard Tommy Tommy yeah thanks oh yeah hold on a second a whole new occupations yeah I hear apartment own demands work don't mean this route this year I like to do that when you first start now be careful upon turning a beautiful amber Voki pit level I'd say they seemed going there anyway [Music] yeah the finished product ten to twelve gallons of beautiful molasses

Channel: Dean Cornett

Views: 93,163

Keywords: Earth Day, appalachian crafts video, making molasses, sustainability video, farming, kitchen staple, sugar cane, garden, agriculture, festival, cane mill, appalachian food, food, cooking

Id: 1aCra4-N1Ho

Length: 15min 23sec (923 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 13 2012