"The Indians with surprise found the mouldering trees of their forests suddenly teeming with ambrosial sweet, and nothing, I am told, can exceed the greedy relish with which they banquet for the first time upon this unbought luxury of the wilderness."
, A Tour on the Prairies
Honey!
Our honey is in! This a good year for honey.
All-natural1, raw2 honey3 liberally drizzled on a hot, home-made biscuit fresh out of the oven — that may be one of the greatest comfort foods known to mankind. With all of our culinary prowess, it is hard to beat that simple combination.
The Carolina Bee Company bottles a limited quantity of the finest North Carolina honey whose primary floral sources are the Tulip Poplar4 and Sourwood trees. We also bottle a number of other minority varieties to include a mix that we call Carolina Wildflower. Depending on pollination contracts for the year, we may be able to produce honeys gathered from various berries and other food crops.
Not only are these varieties some of the best honeys on Earth, but they are local to North Carolina.
If you are interested in high quality, all-natural, chemical-free, pure North Carolina honey, please contact us to be informed when our next honey flow is collected.
- All-natural: no additives (unless specifically a blend), and no chemicals.
- Raw: all we do is run the honey through a screen strainer. No heat added. This is full-flavored honey as nature intended.
- Honey: one of nature's sweetest delights; honey bees gather flower nectar in excess and process it into honey. Quality honey invokes flavored hints and aromas of the nectar's floral sources. Yum!
- The flavor of Tulip Poplar honey has a delicate nuanced flavor that is also a bit bolder than lighter honeys like clover or sourwood. It has an excellent flavor that is uniquely delicious. Todd and Monica's favorite!
Cooking with Honey
Cooking with honey is easy, adds richness to many recipes, and boosts the shelf life of baked goods.
- Honey is roughly 25% to 100% sweeter than table sugar, so when replacing sugar with honey in a recipe, you will need to reduce the amount of sweetener called for in the recipe by one-third to one-half honey for granulated or table sugar.
- Since honey is composed of up to 18% water, you will need to reduce the liquid called for in baked goods by about one-fifth (cup for cup). E.g., if you are replacing sugar with 1 cup of honey, take out 1/5th to 1/4th of a cup of liquid from somewhere else in the recipe (if possible).
- When baking sweets, you should also lower your oven temperature by 25°F (15°C).
- If you are measuring honey by weight, 1 cup will weigh 12 troy ounces.
- To help that honey slide smoothly from your measuring utensils, simply lightly coat the utensil with a vegetable spray before measuring the honey.
- Unless the recipe calls for sour milk or cream, some cooks add the merest pinch of baking soda to the recipes of baked goods to counteract the slight acidity of the honey which may cause over-browning.
- Since it has the ability to absorb and retain moisture, honey is used in the industry to keep baked goods moist and fresh. Use honey in baked goods you plan to mail to keep them bakery-fresh.
- Honey is also an excellent choice to use in salad dressings, since its emulsifying qualities make it a perfect stabilizer.
- Honey will make most recipes “richer” in flavor.
- Note: If your honey has granulated, place the bottle in hot water to reliquify it – honey, if stored in a sealed container, never goes bad.
- Also take a look at the National Honey Board's fact sheet called How the Experts Use Honey. Dadant (beekeeper supplier) also has an excellent document, Cooking it Right with Honey Every Day (honey information and some recipes).
Arafla Cave at Bicorp
near Valencia, Spain.
6000BCE to 10,000BCE.
