Sweet!

Human beings naturally love sweet things. Queen Elizabeth I of England, for example, was renowned for her sweet tooth. American anthropologist Sidney W. Mintz notes in his book Sweetness and Power that the earliest sweet things that humans knew of were fruit and honey. It was only in the last 500–600 years that sugar made from tropical sugar­cane spread across the globe, and at first it was a luxury item that the aristocracy used to symbolize their status and position. Not until the 19th century did scientists develop technologies for refining sugar from sugar beet grown in temperate regions, revolutionizing the global sugar industry.

Records of sugar production in Taiwan go back to the 17th century. In the early days Han Chinese settlers occasionally planted sugarcane, but written records only began with the arrival in Taiwan of the Dutch East India Company in 1624. The company invested capital and recruited Han Chinese to clear land for sugarcane cultivation and to make sugar. In the era of Zheng Chenggong (Koxinga), Taiwan’s sugar industry gradually took shape, and the island became a major producer of cane sugar. Records held by the Taiwan Sugar Corporation show that as early as 1652, sugar was exported to Japan. Later, during the era of Japanese colonial rule, cane sugar became Taiwan’s leading export product.

Sugar in the Taiwanese diet

Tseng Pin-tsang, an associate research fellow in the Institute of Taiwan History at the Academia Sinica, says that under Japanese rule the Japanese developed a modern sugar industry in Taiwan, while many Taiwanese landlords continued to operate their own sugar­cane mills, producing coarse-grained raw granulated sugar for local consumption. At that time anyone with money could buy and sell sugar. It was only during World War II that sugar was rationed and trade was restricted. However, even then there was no scarcity of sugar in Taiwan. In fact, towards the end of the war, when food was in short supply and the colonial government could not provide adequate rice rations, part of the ration was instead given as dried bananas and granulated sugar. This shows that as it became increasingly difficult to transport sugar off the island, there was actually a surplus of it.

Huang Shaw-herng, a professor in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, avers that Taiwan’s long history of sugar production has had a major impact on local ­diets. He mentions various sweetened foods eaten here, including old-fashioned tangcong (“candy scallion”), ­dragon’s beard candy (filled candies wrapped in hand-pulled candy­floss), seasoned millet mush, the sugar-coated haws often eaten at temple festivals, and the new year’s cakes and sponge cakes consumed at the Lunar New Year, while in Hakka communities there is rice pudding made with brown sugar. In modern times people have developed sweet hand-shaken drinks and boba (pearl milk tea) has become famous around the world. Also, sugar is often added to dishes in Southern Taiwanese cuisine. These examples illustrate how sugar plays an important role in the daily diet of Taiwanese all year round.

Huang says that in 1895, when Japanese rule began, granulated sugar was already an international commodity. In many countries sugar production was mechanized, with competitiveness depending on production costs. Under Japanese rule the colonial government tried to upgrade sugar making technology, but at that time agriculture in Taiwan was based on the tenant farmer system, and land rent led to high production costs. The international sugar trade was very competitive, and as Taiwan transitioned from a primarily agricultural society to an industrial society after World War II, its sugar industry fell into decline. Nevertheless, the sugar industry continued in Taiwan for nearly four centuries, a history unmatched by any other industry on the island.

Zhuo Chuangqing learned to make tangcong from his father-in-law. Now his sons and daughters-in-law have taken on the family business, keeping the tradition alive.

Tangcong can be wrapped in popiah with peanut powder, sesame powder or coriander to make old-fashioned tangcong rolls.

Making tangcong candy

There’s not much old-fashioned handmade candy around anymore. In the Tangcong Culture Hall at the National Center for Traditional Arts in Yilan County, master candy maker Zhuo Chuangqing is making traditional tangcong (“candy scallion”), attracting many visitors to gather round and watch. He deftly wraps a mass of amber-­colored candy dough around a wooden peg and repeatedly stretches and folds it with rhythmic movements. In less than a minute, the amber dough is stretched out into a long skein of hollow candy. It is named tangcong because its shape resembles a scallion, and its pearly luster gives it a great deal of elegance.

Next, Zhuo loops the skein of tangcong over a wooden rod to let it cool and set, and then works with his son Zhuo Weitong to rapidly cut it into sections, which are quickly packaged to avoid them absorbing moisture. The congtou (“scallion bulb”)—the end that was hung on the wooden peg as the candy was pulled—is firm and chewy, while the segments of hollow congbai (“scallion white”) that have been cut from the skein are brittle and crispy. Each type of tangcong has its adherents. An elderly visitor tells the Zhuos: “You’ve taken me back to my childhood!”

The way people consume tangcong nowadays is to add it to hot coffee or tea in place of granulated sugar, or to add it to braised pork knuckle to make the meat more glossy.

Thirty years ago Zhuo Chuangqing learned how to make tangcong from his father-in-law, and a year later he went into business for himself, making tangcong at temple festivals and night markets. Thanks to his solid mastery of the technique, he was invited 17 years ago by the National Center for Traditional Arts to become their resident master candy maker.

Although the ingredients of tangcong—sugar and ­water—look simple enough, great skill is required to make it. First white sugar must be mixed with water to make a syrup, and simmered over a low flame until most of the water evaporates and the clear syrup is transformed into amber-­colored “liquid caramel.” The caramel is then poured into a wok floating in water to cool the liquid while turning it over by hand, until it congeals into a pliable dough-like mass that is firm enough to be pulled into tangcong. Throughout the heating process it is essential to carefully control the temperature and moisture content of the syrup as well as the heat of the flame, to avoid burning the sugar.

In summer the cooking process gets intensely hot, for the syrup has to be heated to 170°C, and even after the candy dough has been turned by hand and is ready to be pulled into tangcong, it still has a residual temperature of 70°C. Tangcong makers are thus at high risk of skin burns, and the oppressively hot working en­vironment has scared off many folks who had thought of learning this craft. The number of tangcong masters in Taiwan today can be counted on the fingers of two hands. But Zhuo Chuangqing’s two sons have both learned this skill from their father, making them the third generation in the family to have mastered it.

In the past Zhuo has tried making tangcong from imported beet sugar, but he found that it was not easy to handle. He says that candy dough made from the white cane sugar produced in Taiwan is more pliable and strong, and handles well. As for the taste, “It’s hard to tell them apart—they’re both very sweet.”

We try some of the tangcong, and the sweet flavor explodes in our mouths. Zhuo says that tangcong has to be sweet to taste good. The sweetness has to be at a level such that young people who have developed a taste for candy find it “sweet enough” and will eat one tangcong roll after another. Tangcong rolls are made by wrapping the candy in popiah skins (thin pancakes).

The dough that the Zhuo family uses to make their own popiah is made from wheat flour and water. One has to get the ratio of water to flour just right—what Zhuo Weitong calls the “golden ratio”—to give the popiah its proper soft and chewy texture.

Refinery creates Sugar City

In Taiwan, the sugarcane varieties used for making sugar have mainly been grown in the center and south of the island. According to research by the Bureau of Cultural Heritage of the Ministry of Culture, during the Qing Dynasty there were a great many sugarcane mills in Taiwan. The Japanese developed a modern sugar industry, upgrading the old cane mills and setting up modern sugar refineries by attracting investment to establish sugar manufacturing corporations. By the end of Japanese rule, there were 43 modern refineries across Taiwan, owned by four major corporations including the Meiji Sugar Manufacturing Company. After World War II these operations were taken over by the Taiwan Sugar Corporation (Taisugar).

The sugar industry required an enormous amount of farm labor and drove local development. The town of Huwei in Yunlin County grew up from nothing after a sugar refinery was set up there, and came to be known as “Sugar City.” Taiwan’s sugar industry was at its most robust from 1950 through 1965, but thereafter international sugar prices became highly volatile, and the island’s economy was transitioning to “using agriculture to support industry.” The sugar industry steadily diversified, with the vast areas of land occupied by refineries and their attached sugarcane fields being used to develop other economic activities such as pig farming, moth orchid cultivation, hotels, tourism, and biotechnology.

Of the 43 modern sugar refineries that existed at the end of Japanese rule, today only those at Huwei in Yunlin and Shanhua in Tainan are still making sugar. The others closed down mainly due to high labor costs. The two refineries produce sugar from December through March each year, making around 50,000 metric tons for the domestic market. Taiwan consumes some 610,000 metric tons of granulated sugar per year. To reduce production costs, in the 1990s Taisugar built a new refinery at Xiaogang in Kaohsiung, which uses imported raw sugar to make white granulated sugar for domestic consumption. Sugar is also imported by private enterprises.

Taisugar states that at present its domestically produced cane sugar is made from local sugarcane grown in its own fields and under contract. The finished granulated sugar is golden yellow in color and has a rich fragrance of sugar­cane, and a different texture and flavor from imported sugar. In 2012 Taisugar joined the Traceable Agricultural Products program of the Council of Agriculture, which enables end users to access information about the producers, processors, and packagers of sugar sold to the public, so that consumers can be sure of buying authentic local cane sugar.

The golden age of sugar

The two-foot-six-inch-guage trains that were once used to transport sugarcane to refineries are still in operation at six current and former refinery sites: Huwei in Yunlin, Xihu in Changhua, Suantou in Chiayi, Xinying and Wushulin in Tainan, and Qiaotou in Kaohsiung. Huwei is still a working refinery and the trains haul cane there to be processed. At the other sites, the trains today serve as tourist attractions.

To document the history of Taiwan’s sugar industry, the National Development Council has adopted a plan to create a “Sugar Industry Railway Trail” as part of the “National Greenway” system. The trail will link together former sugar refinery sites with walking and cycling trails along the routes of some of the narrow-gauge sugar railways. Thus far construction has begun on sections of the trail in Changhua County and Tainan City.

The old sugar refineries are valuable both as heritage sites and as tourism resources. Built a century ago, Qiaotou was the first modern sugar refinery in all Taiwan, and it now houses Taiwan’s only sugar industry museum, the Exhibition Hall of Sugar Industry History. Many of the old refineries still sell their own delectable variations on Taisugar’s well-known retro popsicles.

The tracks of the sugar railway at the Suantou Refinery have been restored to allow the trains to run as far as the Chiayi high-speed rail station, and in 2023 they are expected to be extended into the campus of the Southern Branch of the National Palace Museum.

It was thanks to sugar production that Taiwan first made its appearance on the world stage, and the foreign currency that sugar earned was a mainstay of the island’s economy, and supported the upgrading and development of domestic industry. Today sugar is a common consumer product. However, old-fashioned tangcong, old sugar refineries, the sweet fragrance of sugar refining, and the slow-­moving narrow-gauge trains all still serve to remind us of the golden age of Taiwanese sugar that was built a century ago on sugar­cane.

At the end of the era of Japanese rule there were 43 modern sugar refineries in Taiwan, but of these only those at Huwei and Shanhua still produce sugar today.

The narrow-gauge trains that once transported sugarcane are now tourist attractions.