SCIENCE OF SUGAR CONFECTIONERY, THE

Confectionery is a topic close to many people's hearts and its manufacture involves some interesting science. The confectionery industry is divided into three classes: chocolate, flour and sugar confectionery. It is the background science of this latter category that is covered in The Science of Sugar Confectionery. The manufacture of confectionery is not a science based industry, as these products have traditionally been created by skilled confectioners working empirically. In fact, scientific understanding of the production process has only been acquired retroactively. Historically however, sugar confectionery has had technological synergies with the pharmaceutical industry, such as making sugar tablets and applying panned sugar coatings.