Codger_64
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- Oct 8, 2004
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Being an early riser, I generally prepare my own breakfast. Always coffee, sometimes bacon or sausage and biscuits, quite often rich farm fresh eggs from my own henhouses. This morning, I opted for my "weekend special" of french toast with peppered bacon on the side. As I was preparing my plate and reached for my honey jar, I remembered emptying it last week. It sat clean, gleeming, yet forlornly empty in the cupboard. Never fear, honey is near! I reached for my stash, one of my several gallon jugs of honey. After adding a generous dollop to my platter of french toast, I noticed the label I had placed upon the neck of the glass jug. "Tupelo Honey...Wewahitchka Florida...July 1996. Ten year old vintage! Man was it good!
Honey, or "bee poop", as I refer to it with my children and grandchildren, keeps seemingly forever. Placed by me in the steralized glass jugs a decade ago, the light golden honey has slightly darkened in color, but the flavor is the same as when freshly purchased from the "bee man" when I lived in Florida and was packing my larder with staples. The beekeeper was none other than Ben Lanier, third generation beekeeper, consultant and extra in the award winning movie "Ulee's Gold" starring Peter Fonda. Now, tupelo honey has it's own mild, supersweet flavor, and is unmatched by honeys from anywhere else in the world. For one thing, Tupelo honey is produced in the Chipola and Apalachicola river basins of northwest Florida from honey gathered from the tupelo gum tree which grows there. Other honeys I have stored tend to granulate, and have to be reconstituted in a warm water bath. Tupelo honey is the only one that does not granulate. The Laniers attribute this to the exceptionally high fructose content ( 44.03% ). Some doctors even suggest it as a sweetener for diabetics due to this high fructose and low (29.98%) glucose content.
Now, not all honey produced there is Tupelo honey. The Laniers use the darker, lesser quality honey first produced by their hives in the spring to feed the hives, and sell the excess as "bakery honey", used in commercial cooking. The ti-ti, black gum, willow trees, and other plants which bloom before the white tupelo gum trees do in May and June produce an inferior honey, according to Ben. His Tupelo honey, unlike most, is also all natural, unheated, unfiltered. It doesn't need it. Heating degrades honey, and dissapates a lot of the healthful constituants like...In addition to its sugars, honey contains as its minor components a considerable number of mineral constituents, seven members of the B-vitamin complex, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), dextrin's, plant pigments, amino acids and other organic acids, traces of protein, esters and other aromatic compounds, and several enzymes.
As I said, I do have other honeys, and each has it's own unique "bouquet" and color. White Clover honey, Watermelon Honey, Buckwheat honey, etc. These are the "single-flower honeys" gathered from hives placed to polinate specific agricultural crops and rotated as new crops bloom.
Wild Mountain Flower honey from the Ozarks, and other "wild" honeys are blends of whatever wild plants the bees have access too, and generally are darker and have a stonger flavor. These are best for imparting some natural resistance in "hay fever" sufferers, as they all contain a small percentage of pollen, promoting the body to build up a natural immunity to airborn pollen. In order to best take advantage of this property, experts suggest that you acquire honey produced in your locality, as it will contain pollen from the plants you are most likely to react to.
Some "wild" honeys are also produced like the Laniers Tupelo honey, specificaly harvested as the local trees and flowers cycle in and out of bloom. Black Locust, Basswood, and various orchard trees such as Orange and Apple Honey are examples.
I am still partial to the delecate flavor of my Tupelo honey, and with three sealed glass gallon jars put back, I'll be supplied for quite some time. A favorite drink is Sassafrass bark tea sweetened with this honey! I know, sassafrass is forbidden in Canada. I tried to send some to a friend a few years back and found out the hard way that it was contraband.
Codger
http://www.lltupelohoney.com/index.htm
Honey, or "bee poop", as I refer to it with my children and grandchildren, keeps seemingly forever. Placed by me in the steralized glass jugs a decade ago, the light golden honey has slightly darkened in color, but the flavor is the same as when freshly purchased from the "bee man" when I lived in Florida and was packing my larder with staples. The beekeeper was none other than Ben Lanier, third generation beekeeper, consultant and extra in the award winning movie "Ulee's Gold" starring Peter Fonda. Now, tupelo honey has it's own mild, supersweet flavor, and is unmatched by honeys from anywhere else in the world. For one thing, Tupelo honey is produced in the Chipola and Apalachicola river basins of northwest Florida from honey gathered from the tupelo gum tree which grows there. Other honeys I have stored tend to granulate, and have to be reconstituted in a warm water bath. Tupelo honey is the only one that does not granulate. The Laniers attribute this to the exceptionally high fructose content ( 44.03% ). Some doctors even suggest it as a sweetener for diabetics due to this high fructose and low (29.98%) glucose content.
Now, not all honey produced there is Tupelo honey. The Laniers use the darker, lesser quality honey first produced by their hives in the spring to feed the hives, and sell the excess as "bakery honey", used in commercial cooking. The ti-ti, black gum, willow trees, and other plants which bloom before the white tupelo gum trees do in May and June produce an inferior honey, according to Ben. His Tupelo honey, unlike most, is also all natural, unheated, unfiltered. It doesn't need it. Heating degrades honey, and dissapates a lot of the healthful constituants like...In addition to its sugars, honey contains as its minor components a considerable number of mineral constituents, seven members of the B-vitamin complex, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), dextrin's, plant pigments, amino acids and other organic acids, traces of protein, esters and other aromatic compounds, and several enzymes.
As I said, I do have other honeys, and each has it's own unique "bouquet" and color. White Clover honey, Watermelon Honey, Buckwheat honey, etc. These are the "single-flower honeys" gathered from hives placed to polinate specific agricultural crops and rotated as new crops bloom.
Wild Mountain Flower honey from the Ozarks, and other "wild" honeys are blends of whatever wild plants the bees have access too, and generally are darker and have a stonger flavor. These are best for imparting some natural resistance in "hay fever" sufferers, as they all contain a small percentage of pollen, promoting the body to build up a natural immunity to airborn pollen. In order to best take advantage of this property, experts suggest that you acquire honey produced in your locality, as it will contain pollen from the plants you are most likely to react to.
Some "wild" honeys are also produced like the Laniers Tupelo honey, specificaly harvested as the local trees and flowers cycle in and out of bloom. Black Locust, Basswood, and various orchard trees such as Orange and Apple Honey are examples.
I am still partial to the delecate flavor of my Tupelo honey, and with three sealed glass gallon jars put back, I'll be supplied for quite some time. A favorite drink is Sassafrass bark tea sweetened with this honey! I know, sassafrass is forbidden in Canada. I tried to send some to a friend a few years back and found out the hard way that it was contraband.
Codger
http://www.lltupelohoney.com/index.htm
