Question About Beet Rock Sugar
So I have some of Teavana’s beet rock sugar, and I’m looking for a cheaper version somewhere. I have noticed that a lot of companies that sell supplies for home-brewing beer sell this kind of sugar at a lower price. They all state that it is “fermentable.” I was just wondering if any of you know anything about this beer-fermenting beet sugar? It says it is German beet rock sugar, so shouldn’t it be exactly the same as the Teavana rock sugar? Or could it be unsafe for casual consumption for some reason (exposure to chemicals, I don’t know)? Have any of you used any of the beet sugar from breweries in your tea?
You might try an Amazon search for rock sugar and come up with something cheaper. Teavana’s sugar is expensive and frequently bother’s my stomach anyway. Beet sugar can bother some peoples’s stomachs but it doesn’t seem to effect me quite as much as it did two years ago. I just use Sugar in the Raw, it is an excellent sugar, good in tea and available cheap at your local warehouse club. It tends to be expensive at the supermarket.
Yeah, I could just use sugar in the raw, which is pretty much what I used to do. The Teavana sugar actually hasn’t bothered my stomach, but yeah I’ll check Amazon again. What I saw right away was basically as expensive as Teavana, but I could probably do a large bulk purchase.
After I made this post I did an Amazon search and an EBay search, just out of curiosity. Came up with nothing noticeably cheaper but Amazon does have one that is slightly cheaper, by about $1 a pound.
http://www.amazon.com/AMBER-ROCK-CANDY-CRYSTALS-5LBS/dp/B0008IUUL8/ref=sr_1_6?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1424960112&sr=1-6&keywords=rock+sugar
Logic suggests that the Beet Rock sugar sold for making beer is completely safe to consume or they couldn’t put it into beer. The question to ask the people who sell it is does it have any other flavors that would effect the taste of tea. Conceivably, a flavor great for beer might be terrible for tea. I am curious what you come up with about this.
Probably, except that the fermentation process and heating might kill any bad bacteria or something. I don’t know why it would have bacteria — maybe processed jointly with some other food?
I doubt that bacteria would be a problem. However, I did a quick search for companies that sell home brewing supplies and it was not that much cheaper that Teavana. I think the cheapest was $6 for a pound. I think Teavana works out to $7 a pound or so. You may have found something cheaper. A lot of smaller tea companies sell rock sugar at an even more expensive price than Teavana. Just look at the price at www.discoverteas.com if I remember correctly.
So this is really cheap, but it’s not in rock form:
http://www.vitacost.com/now-foods-real-food-beet-sugar-3-lbs
Is there any reason that it really needs to be crystallized for tea? Does it alter the taste a lot?
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