Indeed you can make brown sugar. It's the simplest of recipes. You only need 2 ingredients. So no problem when you're making a batch of cookies and find yourself out of the store-bought stuff.

1 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon Molasses (or less!)

The molasses doesn't melt the sugar granules, it mixes with it. It's much fresher than the commercially made brown sugar. No hard, uncrushable lumps of hardened molasses.

There's 2 ways to do it. First method is to mix sugar and molasses in a bowl with a fork or spoon until it's well combined, and no clumps of molasses or sugar. I find this method works quicker and better than the next one.

The second method is to put the sugar and molasses in a heavy zip bag, seal it, and work it around with your fingers until it becomes brown sugar. But the bag could burst or unseal.

Cane sugar tastes better and is healthier than the commercial white granulated sugar. I seem to have better results in my baked goods when I use brown sugar made from cane sugar.

If you need a very light brown sugar, use 1/2 teaspoon molasses to 1 cup of sugar. Adjust with more molasses if you'd like darker brown sugar.

If your mixture is too dark, just pour in a little extra sugar, and mix until it's as light as needed, that easy!

When I make brown sugar, I usually put 3 cups of cane sugar into a container, then add about two teaspoons molasses, and begin mixing with a heavy spoon. I keep smashing all the brown lumps out until it's a well combined mixture.

That's the way my old folks made it. We never lacked for brown sugar.