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Local Honey!

post #1 of 26
4/18/12 at 8:49am
Thread Starter 

Anyone else into local honey?

 

My DH came home yesterday with 2 things of it from a place he found while he was at work.  One is a blueberry and I forget what the other is; but its the one the lady said is best for allergy sufferers.  I need to do more research on it; but DD has had a miserable spring for allergies.  And I'm not enjoying it either. 

But man this honey tastes sooo different than what I buy in the store!!  It's more mild, yet sweeter. drool.gif  It's very very good.  I think I may be hooked!!

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post #2 of 26
4/18/12 at 9:02am
My mom is a beekeeper. smile.gif

She doesn't have a specific grove that they pollinate, so we classify it as "wildflower" honey.

It tastes much better because the kind you buy in the store isn't actually honey. It's Karo-style corn syrup with artificial flavors and colors, with just a drop of real honey to fit the FDA "standards." rolleyes.gif

Real honey is delicious!! It has a much lighter flavor than store "honey." And depending on what plants the bees pollinated that year, or what time of year it was harvested, it can taste totally different. Spring honey is incredibly light, and it's usually quite light colored. I've seen spring honey that was extremely light yellow, almost clear. It gets darker and more intense in flavor as the year goes on; you can harvest at least twice, maybe more depending on how the year has been for your bees.

Anyway. All that's to say that if you like it, you should seek out local honey wherever you can. It usually isn't hard to find and can be more expensive than the store-bought kind, but it's totally worth it.

ETA: Yes, it can really help those with seasonal allergies. You're essentially ingesting a pollen byproduct, and it can really help your body learn to recognize that pollen isn't an alien intruder. agree.gif
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post #3 of 26
4/18/12 at 9:25am

I haven't had honey in a long time, but I do enjoy it, so I might have to pick some up! biggthumpup.gif

 

Dana picked up some locally made maple syrup over the weekend at a farmers market and he has just been in his glory. rolleyes.gif
 

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post #4 of 26
4/18/12 at 10:21am
I buy nothing but local honey here - there is a producer just down the road, and all hte markets are full of it, dso there is a big choice of types. I love chestnut honey, also elderflower, and use it in all sorts of ways, added to cakes and sauces as well as on toast. Delicious!
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post #5 of 26
4/18/12 at 10:43am

When I was a kid I would always go to the local beekeeper with my dad. My dad loves honey and puts bee pollen in his coffee and refuses to buy either at a store. Apart from the honey tasting much better, I loved going there and actually seeing how things worked and what was involved. Hearing all those bees buzzing really gets you in the mood for some honey. I can hardly stand the honey I get at the grocery store now. It tastes so sugary and fake, like tasting the sugar water they call "maple syrup" after you've grown up tapping the maple trees in your back yard.

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post #6 of 26
4/18/12 at 7:32pm
My neighbor sells honey. Her husband is a beekeeper .he has them out of town somewhere. I love fresh raw honey

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post #7 of 26
4/18/12 at 7:43pm

I'm sitting here drinking some tea with local raw honey in it! I LOVE IT!

 

Since I've been living alone, I've always bought raw honey. I take it for my allergies and give it to the dogs for theirs. You can also use it on wounds, it's sticky but you wrap it and it works great. Also great for burns. 

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post #8 of 26
4/18/12 at 8:54pm
Thread Starter 

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by speakhandsforme View Post

My mom is a beekeeper. smile.gif
She doesn't have a specific grove that they pollinate, so we classify it as "wildflower" honey.
It tastes much better because the kind you buy in the store isn't actually honey. It's Karo-style corn syrup with artificial flavors and colors, with just a drop of real honey to fit the FDA "standards." rolleyes.gif
Real honey is delicious!! It has a much lighter flavor than store "honey." And depending on what plants the bees pollinated that year, or what time of year it was harvested, it can taste totally different. Spring honey is incredibly light, and it's usually quite light colored. I've seen spring honey that was extremely light yellow, almost clear. It gets darker and more intense in flavor as the year goes on; you can harvest at least twice, maybe more depending on how the year has been for your bees.
Anyway. All that's to say that if you like it, you should seek out local honey wherever you can. It usually isn't hard to find and can be more expensive than the store-bought kind, but it's totally worth it.
ETA: Yes, it can really help those with seasonal allergies. You're essentially ingesting a pollen byproduct, and it can really help your body learn to recognize that pollen isn't an alien intruder. agree.gif

Ooh thanks for sharing that!!  The honey is very light in color.  I do think I'm going to have a hard time going back!  Esp for drizzling it on toast like I did this morning.  Esp toast with peanut butter! YUM!   Or in my honey lemon tea!!

 

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kailie View Post

I haven't had honey in a long time, but I do enjoy it, so I might have to pick some up! biggthumpup.gif

 

Dana picked up some locally made maple syrup over the weekend at a farmers market and he has just been in his glory. rolleyes.gif
 

 

Oh yes that is good!  I haven't had any in AGES!!  I'm originally from Upstate NY and my family had a camp up in the Adirondaks when I was a kid.  Nothing like fresh maple syrup or maple syrup candy!!

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by jennyranson View Post

I buy nothing but local honey here - there is a producer just down the road, and all hte markets are full of it, dso there is a big choice of types. I love chestnut honey, also elderflower, and use it in all sorts of ways, added to cakes and sauces as well as on toast. Delicious!

Oh see now I want to go try all different types!! laughing02.gif

 

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by rad65 View Post

When I was a kid I would always go to the local beekeeper with my dad. My dad loves honey and puts bee pollen in his coffee and refuses to buy either at a store. Apart from the honey tasting much better, I loved going there and actually seeing how things worked and what was involved. Hearing all those bees buzzing really gets you in the mood for some honey. I can hardly stand the honey I get at the grocery store now. It tastes so sugary and fake, like tasting the sugar water they call "maple syrup" after you've grown up tapping the maple trees in your back yard.

 

My cousin has made her own syrup....lots of work to it from what my Grandpa said!

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by nerdrock View Post

I'm sitting here drinking some tea with local raw honey in it! I LOVE IT!

 

Since I've been living alone, I've always bought raw honey. I take it for my allergies and give it to the dogs for theirs. You can also use it on wounds, it's sticky but you wrap it and it works great. Also great for burns. 

I think I'll be doing tea with it tomorrow.  Trying to kick a dry sore throat!

 

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post #9 of 26
4/19/12 at 4:54am

We only buy local honey; it seems to have a better taste than the stuff we buy in stores. We have a farmers market in the area on Wednesdays and during the summer, I'll walk over there during my lunch break to buy local produce, honey, eggs, etc. There's a local beekeeper who's really an expert on bees and on the bee colony collapse. He was taking his bees to Florida to pollinate the crops there for many years; during the beginning of the colony collapse, he lost over half his bees. The amount of knowledge that man has is truly amazing.

 

I don't really care for the taste of honey (maybe it's too sweet?), but I do love to use it in cooking and especially in baking.

 

As for maple syrup, when we go to Connecticut, I always bring back two or three quarts of Grade B maple syrup. Grade B is better for baking because the maple taste doesn't "bake out" as it does when using Grade A. And we can't get Grade B around here; all we can find is Grade A. My MIL even switched over to Grade B, now too, so I buy a quart for her as well.

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post #10 of 26
4/21/12 at 7:15am

Have they figured out what has caused the collapse of the honey bees?
 

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post #11 of 26
4/21/12 at 8:36am

Used to buy it.........friend of mine was a beekeeper and he sold the stuff out of his garage right along with tires and car parts. I had to revert to store stuff when he retired and health concerns forced him to give up the bees as well. Sure miss that stuff, far superior to store bought

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post #12 of 26
4/21/12 at 9:06am
I love trying different honey. You get a lot of delicious variety in New Zealand, quite expensive but delicious. Here in Canada I like to buy from the Farmers Market, but I don't often go.
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post #13 of 26
4/21/12 at 3:18pm

We buy local honey too.

 

This local lady makes it and has all sorts of flavors. Most recently I have liked the cherry honey! Something about it it just GOOD on a sore throat!! Also have banana honey and all sorts of flavors. But the cherry honey is the best (I guess cherry-honey ricola cough drops) knew what they were talking about.
 

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post #14 of 26
4/21/12 at 3:55pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by zohdee View Post

Have they figured out what has caused the collapse of the honey bees?
Pesticides frown.gif. Specifically imidacloprid, the pesticide used in Advantage. Apparently it's used on corn a lot (probably why it's not working on fleas so well anymore, too). Too bad the bees aren't becoming immune like the fleas are. . .

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120405224653.htm
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post #15 of 26
4/21/12 at 9:21pm
Thread Starter 

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nebula View Post

We buy local honey too.

 

This local lady makes it and has all sorts of flavors. Most recently I have liked the cherry honey! Something about it it just GOOD on a sore throat!! Also have banana honey and all sorts of flavors. But the cherry honey is the best (I guess cherry-honey ricola cough drops) knew what they were talking about.
 

 

Ooo I'd like to try that!  I've had an awful cold this week so I've been putting the blueberry honey DH got into my tea and sipping that all day. 

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post #16 of 26
4/21/12 at 11:24pm
I think those sound like flavored honey. Which is super yummy but isn't the same as the different "varieties" of honey. Like, orange flavored honey is not the same as orange blossom honey. The flavored ones have flavoring added. The other kind naturally taste different (supposedly) because of what kind of flowers the bees pollinated. I say "supposedly" because I can't taste the difference laughing02.gif. I guess it's just too subtle for my tastebuds! tongue.gif
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post #17 of 26
4/22/12 at 1:44am
We've basically had to give up on local honey here because the bee population has been nearly decimated, supposedly by a virus, but we usually buy some when we're in Hungary. The only maple syrup you can get is imported from Canada or the U.S. and only available in a few stores. Germans just haven't gotten into maple syrup.
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post #18 of 26
4/22/12 at 4:39am

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by Willowy View Post


Pesticides frown.gif. Specifically imidacloprid, the pesticide used in Advantage. Apparently it's used on corn a lot (probably why it's not working on fleas so well anymore, too). Too bad the bees aren't becoming immune like the fleas are. . .
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120405224653.htm

 

Bees just don't make honey...they pollinate.  I barely saw any honey bees last year.  I grow peppers and rely on those friends.

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post #19 of 26
4/22/12 at 5:02am

My first "real" job was a helper to a beekeeper.  Fascinating job, and bee stings don't bother me at all, now!
 

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post #20 of 26
4/22/12 at 5:11am

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by mrblanche View Post

My first "real" job was a helper to a beekeeper.  Fascinating job, and bee stings don't bother me at all, now!
 

 

Stupid question here...but do the bees get to know you?  I would love to get involved in beekeeping.  Once bees sting you they die, correct?  They have a barbed stinger and when pulled out the bee dies. 

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post #21 of 26
4/22/12 at 5:12am

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by zohdee View Post

 

 

Bees just don't make honey...they pollinate.  I barely saw any honey bees last year.  I grow peppers and rely on those friends.

 

A few years ago, we hardly saw honey bees. And some of the flowers that we grow are specifically for honey bees because they are so important. They are big pollinators and we were a little worried. Then we started hearing about colony collapse and then we really started to worry. Without honey bees, we'd be in big trouble. Without pollination, no food....or really, really expensive food. It's as simple as that. Thankfully, the last couple of years have seen a bit of an increase in the number of bees we've been seeing. But nothing like we used to see in the back flower bed.

 

I think the pesicide manufacturer refuses to admit that the pesticides are the cause of colony collapse? Unless they've changed their tune.

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post #22 of 26
4/22/12 at 6:00am
This year we're seeing a huge increase in the number of bumblebees - they seem to have moved in to replace the honey bees. It might just be the lower than average temperatures, though.
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post #23 of 26
4/22/12 at 8:25am
A lot of people simply don't realize how much depends on bees getting busy and pollinating flowers. I didn't know they'd found a cause for colony collapse, but I'm not surprised to hear that pesticides are the culprit. What about the varroa mite? That was blamed too, or maybe that was a secondary thing, a double whammy for the poor bees.
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post #24 of 26
4/22/12 at 11:01am

We used to live in the desert, and there were lots of beekeepers in surrounding communities who sold honey.  Miss that.

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post #25 of 26
4/22/12 at 3:08pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by zohdee View Post


Stupid question here...but do the bees get to know you?  I would love to get involved in beekeeping.  Once bees sting you they die, correct?  They have a barbed stinger and when pulled out the bee dies. 

No they don't get to know you, which is why you wear the silly suit and hat and carry a smoke dispenser. biggrin.gif They only live for a few months apiece, so new ones come in all the time.
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post #26 of 26
4/22/12 at 7:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by pushylady View Post

I didn't know they'd found a cause for colony collapse, but I'm not surprised to hear that pesticides are the culprit.

If you notice the date on the article, it's very recent. I mean, they JUST figured it out. There were all kinds of theories up until now. I hope something will be done about it now that they know.
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