Hey Roy,

>>Kirt:
>>Do you test honies at all?

>Roy:
>Yes, I found an unheated local brand that I really like. I think I
>get stops, but only after enormous quantities (2-10 table spoons).
>I'm not sure if the brand mixes honies, but I plan to call and find out.

Kirt:
Enormous quantities, eh? Hmmm...I'm not sure what the proper adjective
would be for my formerly-consumed quantities then. ;)

Nearly all extracted honey is mixed to some degree; indeed, honey in the
_comb_ is often mixed. There is no way to limit foraging bees to one single
flowering plant type. Yet when one particular flower is abundant the honey
becomes that "flavor".

We had a lot of fun with honey in our first months instincto (in
Milwaukee). We bought "supers" of comb from three different beekeepers who
had high standards of practice (mostly not feeding sugar--ie leaving plenty
of comb for the winter and spring to last the hives until the first
flowerings of spring). We bought an old two frame hand-crank centrifuge
extractor and jarred each frame as it's own "flavor", having fun coming up
with names. If a frame had a particularly interesting flavor we would not
extract it but "run the frame" as comb honey.Most of our honey consumption
was fresh comb--the jarringing was for a rainy day that never really came
;) We always had a couple frames going. At times there would be a distinct
pattern to the placement of particular honies within the cells of a single
frame, and it was not unusual for us to have had a real rorshack design
going as we spooned out the particalar nectar/honey which tasted best.
Often there were many flavors in a single frame. So you can see that it is
kinda impossible to consider any particular honey being unmixed or "pure
<particular flavor>". Nevertheless, with a little experience one comes to
recognise flavors, often having little to do with the labeled flavor.
Alfalfa and clover are very common flavors but the labels are sometimes not
very indicative of the flavors, especially in comb honey.

Melisa and I were lackies for a honey operation one season (95/96) at
"Wilderland" (a New Zealand organic horticulture/apiculture
operation/community). Hard but satisfying work. But it did prove to us the
silliness of labels. Dozens of supers would be extracted at a time and
stored in vats and then jarred. Lots of comb was cut as well and sold in
chunks. Then the folks would sit around and taste test it and decide which
of three or four flavors they would call the batch. Regardless of
occasional laws requiring a high percentage of honey labeled x to be made
from nectar of x, there is no realistic standardization given the nature of
the small enterprises which provide the least denatured honies. Every honey
(especially comb honey) is its own unique flavor.

But tish tish, honey seems to be a pleasure which wanes, at least in terms
of quantities. I have eaten as much a pound or more of comb honey per meal
(as many as four or five times per week, occasinally twice a day) in the
early weeks of instincto. The stop is always there. After a couple months
the attraction fell away and now I am "lucky" to eat an oz or two before
the stop. We still have about 80 lbs of jarred honey from those early
months in Milwaukee, and some other bought honies which seemed OK, but we
rarely test them anymore (many months might go by before we even think of
it)--perhaps they will become our family heirlooms ;)

But in general, comb honey is far safer (taste-change-wise) and superior to
jarred honey, no matter how many times the vendor promises the jarred is
truly raw. There is no comparison in fullness and delight of flavor between
comb honey and the same honey jarred. The thing is that most comb honies
(like "raw unheated" jarred honey) will crystalize right in the comb after
a time. Crystalized comb honey is a disappointment in mouthfeel and taste,
whereas crystalized unheated jarred honey can be tasty. And though there is
a clear intellectual argument regarding the "denaturing" of jarred honey,
if it is truly raw it _will_ have a demanding stop in my experience. The
trouble with heavily-mixed honies is that part of the flavor may taste good
while the other part has changed. Still, you'll have a hard time overeating
it...but since small-operation's comb honey is very often available in
health foods stores, I don't see the benefit in messing around with jarred
honey which is almost always of questionable origin/processing. There is
some expensive New Zealand comb honey (of a deep amber color and very
unique flavor) available at times in "gourmet outlets". Freida (the famous
brand/distributor of exotic fruits which find their way all over the USA)
was distributing it a couple years ago but I haven't seen it lately.

(For completeness: I have heard of folks _freezing_ comb honies as a way to
kill "pathegens" and there is some talk about not feeding comb honey to
infants because of a botulism-type poisoning that occured once--a sketchy,
but oft-repeated story. How might freezing affect the taste-change? I don't
know?)

What remains _very_ interesting and flavorful about a bee hive is the
larvae. We have eaten most of our bee larvae (also called brood) in the
tropics, where the honey is very thin, and the wilder varieties are bought
as combs attached to branches which are cleared of bees and cut off. The
honey is thin enough to ferment after a time, but the larvae are an
incredible treat. Very powerful and satisfying. Every month or two I would
be chasing down some wild (actually semi-wild) comb with larvae (one of the
best places in Bangkok is the famous "Weekend Market" called Chatuchak,
which sometimes had fresh "champedak" as well--an infamously strong fruit
("jackfruit's little brother") rivaling durian in its high attraction to
instinctos--Many Thais wouldn't consider eating a champedak raw). If you
think a Thai durian vendor is surprised by a farang (foreiger) who is into
durian, you would get a kick out of the reaction of the honey vendors to my
insistance that the comb be as filled with larvae as possible, that the
rest of the comb is lame in comparison. I have only found two beekeepers in
the States (both in Wisconsin) who have been willing to sell me some brood
(this is hard on a hive since the brood are to hatch into working bees, but
there are situations where brood is "sparable"). I have yet to explore a
source in CA, but I'm sure it is possible if I'd be willing to take the
time/effort to track some down. Writing this up has me salivating at the
thought...;)

And relating to another thread about mixing foods: it would be somewhat
torturous to strictly separate brood from honey from comb wax in a super of
brood (the brood tends toward the center cells and is usually surrounded by
honey). In Thailand we were struck by how much the experience of "chewing
off bites of comb with brood and honey" remined us of eating at an IHOP.
The thin tropical honey (just on the verge of fermenting) was a ringer for
the flavored syrups; the drier and "more papery" comb reminded one in
texture and flavor of a crispy toasted waffle; and the white larvae tasted
very much like melted butter as they burst in the mouth. Chew, chew, chew,
sucking out all the flavor and discarding the wadded bit of comb from your
mouth. If the honey started changing, you would make sure to get a bite
with more brood next. Lovely. If eating aged seafood brings one to the
pleasures of a traditional Eskimo, eating tropical brood/honey/comb from a
branch probably brings one to the pleasure of our distant honey-gathering
tropical ancestors. Like bone marrow, one imagines that the tasty delights
of a hive were probably worth the trouble of obtaining it.

Cheers,
Kirt (waddling down memory lane as Melisa snores)