Patty Clark, age 9, of Palos Verdes Estates, Calif., for her question:

Is it true that brown sugar is good for you?

All our candies and sweet goodies are presents from the plant world. Chocolate comes from the cacao tree, and the lemon tree gives us the fresh flavoring to make lemon drops. Minty herbs give us the juices to flavor our chewing gum. F1owery blossoms give us the sweet syrupy nectar from which the busy bees make honey.

Some peop1e like to sprinkle white sugar on their breakfast cereals. But Andy prefers to use a few gooey teaspoonfuls of brown sugar, pale brown sugar or chocolatey brown sugar. This, he claims, is better for him than the plain white sugar, and what's more it tastes better. Sometimes brown sugar seems to taste as sweet as honey, which is the sweetest tasting sweet in the world.

All sugars, of course, are chemicals. The plain white sugar is one of those foods that gives us lots of fast energy. The brown sugar gives us the same amount of peppy energy. But it also gives us vitamins, those mysterious chemicals that help the body to make the best use of the other foods it gets. There is vitamin b in brown sugar, which helps the body to digest food and also to build and rebuild many of its cells.

There are sugars of many kinds in different plants. The sweet flavor of fresh corn on the cob and garden peas comes from traces of sugar. But our sugar by the pound is given to us by sugar canes and sugar beetb. Sugar cane is a tall, reedy plant, and the sugar beet is an underground root somewhat like a turnip. Both these plants make and atore lots of sugar. Sugar cane stores sugar in the stem, and sugar beet stores sugar in the root, especially in the tapering tip of the root.

Our crystals of plain white sugar are taken from both sugar beets and sugar cane. But most of our good old brown sugar comes from the sugar cane. At harvest time, canes are 12 to 15 feet tall. They are cut down, their green leaves are stripped away and the stems are sent t0 the sugar mill. They are rolled and crushed, shredded and squeezed,

And out comes the brawn molasses juice. The tacky syrup is boiled to make small crystals form in the mixture and then spun around in a whirling machine. Some of the molasses is left clinging to the little crystals. It gives the sugar its brown color, its stickiness and its caramel flavor. It also gives us that extra goodness we get with every spoonful of rich brown sugar.

Sugar, of course, is one of those foods called treats. We save a treat, naturally, for once in a while, and no sensible person eats too much sugar of any kind. It spoils our appetites for more nourishing foods, such as meat and salads, vegetables and dairy foods. It also may ruin our pearly teeth. But a treat of pep giving sugar is fine for just a treat, and when time comes for sugar on cereals and puddings, most people prefer brown sugar.