Gordonville church members aim for 90 gallons of molasses

Molasses may not run in January, but it does in September.

Members of Christ Lutheran Church of Gordonville spent Saturday making sorghum molasses at John Lorberg's farm in Gordonville. The project raises funds for church missions.

"I come out for the fellowship. And the money goes for a good cause," said Joyce Hutson of Gordonville.

The process begins with harvesting the sorghum molasses cane and stripping the stalks. The cane is grown specifically for this project, and the congregation alternates land usage each year. Two acres, donated by Jerry Lorberg and Frank Burns this year, will yield about 80 to 90 gallons of molasses, or 26 to 30 dozen quart jars.

"Church members purchase jars by the dozens and sell them off. We produce 40 to 45 gallons of molasses on a good day," said Jerry Lorberg's wife, Ellen.

The stalks are fed into a press that extracts the juice. The juice is then strained through a cloth and sent through a pipe into the heating pan, where temperatures must reach at least 228 degrees. The molasses is then "paddled" -- or raked through instead of stirred -- skimmed and cooked before being strained again. Nothing is added.

Aside from paddling the molasses along the 12-foot pan, a green slime must be skimmed off the top or else the color and flavor will be affected.

"We know it's done when the bubbles look like frog eyes," Ellen Lorberg said. The solution gets strained one more time and goes into a holding tank to thicken and later be canned.

It takes about 35 people for the operation to run smoothly. The heating pan alone requires a team of four, plus one to add wood to the furnace.

"You need a team to keep each other in check," said Jeff Lorberg, who has been the head cooker for three years.

The event is split over two weekends, the next being Oct. 2 and 3. Participants aim for 40 gallons the first weekend, but if the work goes as slow as -- well, molasses -- the next weekend helps them make up the goal.

Ellen Lorberg said it was Burns who got the church started on making molasses, which has been an annual event since 1997. Burns has made molasses for more than 60 years.

"When there was a shortage of sugar in the '30s people used molasses to sweeten baked goods," Burns said.

Except for last year, when about half the proceeds went to the church building fund, the money goes for missions. The work results in $5,000 to $8,000.

cpagano@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 133