The Opelousas courier., 1892-12-10
MAKING STICKS OF CANDY.
WHAT A REPORTER SAW IN A BIG:
CANDY FACTORY.
How the Candy is Mixed, Boiled, Fla:
vored, Colored, Rolled Into Strips:
and Finally Cut Into Sticks.

FOreu, COtOfou, ksOlsGL AnXp STRIP
and Finally Cut Into Sticks.
TT1E particular candy factory til
News reporter visited is OF
Chambers street, and if yo'
G ever go to the ferry at the foo
of that street, you have, perhaps, seer
below the level of the street, the hug
copper cauidrons in which the sacchar.
inc substance is boiled. This is, per
haps, all that you can ever see of candy
making, unless you can convince the
proprietors of the establishment that you
are in no wise financially interested il
the candy trade. There are secrets
which they do not care to have known
in the trade, and it is necessary for them
to take precautions to keep those secrets
from leaking out.
Once inside the factory you are con
fronted by walls and bare rafters made
white with powdered sugar. A hall
hundred workmen with bare arms and
wearing huge aprons, move about in an
atmosphere, which is about as warm as
one can stand, and laden with an almost
pverpowering odor of sugar. There are
Of least e dozen of the large cauldrons
filed with gallons of sugar and water
undergoing the process of being trans
formed into thousands of jars of stick
candy, for the delectation of more thou
sands of north and south and east and
west side youngsters.
Each of the cauldrons contains a guam
tity of water, into which fifty pounds of
the best white sugar has been placed.
Stick candy is the healthiest you can.
eat, because it is made of pure sugar
and water, favored with some sort of
essential oil and then colored. The ma
terial with which this colerlng is done is
harmless. 1t is cochineal, mixed with
cream of tartar, soda and alum. Such
small quantities of each are used in the
sandy that ever if you should eat an I'M
usually large number of sticks they.
would not injure you because of the
coloring. Of course, stick candy is like
everything else, if you eat too much of
It you are liable to have a pain, but you
can't blame the ingredients for that.
The favoring is as harmless as the
coloring matter. Only pure essential
oils are used, and it may be well to re.
mark that New York is the city which
furnishes these oils to candy-makers
throughout the length n breadth of
the United States. Lemon and pepper
mint are the favorite favors, but large
quantities ofsassafras, cinnamon, winter
green and strawberry are also used.
, When the experienced eye of the
candE3aker tells him that the sugar and
water is done, the contents are dumped
into an iron pot and carried from there
to a huge marble slab, p~lefeifulIy
sprinkled with powdered g A
workman turns the mass over and over
on the table as it spreads out while un-
dergoing the COOLING process. Then hs
mixes with the candy a small quantity of
essential oil, which he pours out of a
bottle before beginning the folding.
As soon as the mixture is cool enough
to handle he divides it and gives one
half to another workman. Then he
rolls his share into the shape of a loaf of
bread and prepares for the interesting
process of putting the stamps on which
will add to its value at least a hundred
per cent. in the eyes of the juvenile
population of the country. Transform
the pile into sticks as it lay, and it
would be plain white candy. While it
was yet warm he had cut off a largo
chunk and had pulled and pulled it over
4 hook until 1t was almost pure white.
This piece he divided into a dozen mar
strips, which were well saturated
with coloring matter. These he stuck
on the loaf parallel.
There was a furnace filed with glow
Ing Goals back of a long wooden table.
This was to keep the candy soft enough
to work. The loaf was placed in front
Of the furnace. and the candy-maker
his hands and arms to the elbows
in powdered sugar. Then he began to
the loaf, as you have probably
seen a baker knead bread.
After he had worked ii this way sufR-
he began rolling it over and oyer
the palms of his hands. When it
mad been worked out into a long strip,
stretching half way down the table,
another workman took hold of it and
reduced it still further in diameter, while
constantly increasing Its length, until it
reached a third workman at the extreme
end of the table from the first one.
This last man rolled it with his palms
until it was the size of a stick.
Thus in a few moments the twenty
6ve-pound lump was transformed into
strips, with stripes, all ready to
be cut into proper lengths for jars. Here
were 200 feet of stick candy, decorated
with red spiral stripes, produced by the
process. When the strips got
more than two feet in length and almost
the desired diameter the men would roll
half a dozen at a time.
Ali that remained to be done was to
cut the long strips into short sticks,
pack them in boxes and ship them to
the candy shops. All this is common
place except the cutting process, which
IS done with a long sharp pair OF shears.
It is no easy matter to cut stick candy
without breaking it. All the long strips
ire laid together, and the lower part of
,he shears slid along the table under
hem, while the upper blade comes down
snaps them apart as clean as if they
lad been cut with a razor. The i'm.
perfect strips and waite candy are
brushed into a pile to be thrown into
he cauldron and used in making candy
# mixed fayors. After this comes the
packing, shipping and eating process,