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I'm making a cranberry sauce from fresh cranberries and want to substitute brown sugar for the 1 cup of white sugar without making the sauce sweeter. What quantity of brown sugar do you suggest?

Cascabel
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Lindy
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  • Brown sugar will give a noticeable caramel flavour to the sauce. I'd advise adding a little at a time until you get the result you want. – ElendilTheTall Nov 26 '14 at 21:34
  • Agreed. There is no sweetness differential between the two, but the flavor of brown sugar is VERY conspicuous and, at least to my way of thinking, not the best companion flavor to cranberries. – Stephen Eure Nov 26 '14 at 21:54
  • I agree with the other comments, you certainly can substitute one to one, but I don't think it wold be a good choice. It makes me wonder if you are under the mistaken impression that brown sugar is less refined than white. Regular brown sugar starts out as normal refined white sugar, to which molasses is added. – Jolenealaska Nov 26 '14 at 22:40
  • I think all of the three comments could have been made an answer. Just because something is simple, it doesn't mean it's a bad answer, as long as it solves the OP's problem. – rumtscho Nov 27 '14 at 09:34
  • For now I'm going to mark this as a duplicate. If you're really interested in something specifically to do with cranberry sauce, feel free to edit to clarify, and we can reopen your question! – Cascabel Nov 28 '14 at 06:33
  • Thanks for the helpful information. I was under the impression that brown sugar adds a "richer" flavor, and has more simple sugars due to molasses component, therefore yielding increased sweetness. Stephen's comment that brown sugar may not be the best companion flavor to cranberries, got me thinking that I've never seen a jam or preserve recipe with brown sugar! Also thanks for link to America's Test Kitchen. Happy Thanksgiving – Lindy Nov 28 '14 at 18:09

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Dupe, but a good question. See Satanicpuppies answer here: Brown sugar instead of white sugar

I know you asked re: cranberry sauce specifically, but this is a great article regarding the differences in sugars, generically, which might help in the future:

"Sugar can be a single molecule made up of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen—like glucose and fructose. Other sugars, like sucrose, or white table sugar, are made up of multiple molecules (in this case, one glucose and one fructose), tied together with chemical bonds. Now, when sucrose is heated with an acid, it breaks back down into the two smaller sugars, glucose and fructose, resulting in something we call invert sugar. This small chemical change makes a big difference: While sucrose is hygroscopic, invert sugar is even more water-loving.

And this can make a tremendous difference when, say, you want to bake a chewy, rather than crunchy, cookie."

http://www.americastestkitchenfeed.com/cooking-science/2012/10/we-prove-it-sugar-changes-texture-and-sweetness/

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