Honey has been a valued food in many parts of the world, both in primitive societies and sophisticated civilizations. Hunter-gatherers are adept at removing honey from bee hives located in hollow tree trunks, using smoke to drive away the bees. In some primitive groups, honey supplies a large portion of total calories at certain times of the year. The Aborigines of Australia prized honey and distinguished between two types–light and dark. A neolithic rock painting in Spain shows a man collecting wild honey.
Egyptian writings dating from about 5500 BC refer to honey. At that time, Lower Egypt was called Bee Land while Upper Egypt was called Reed Land. Apiculture was well established in the 5th dynasty (about 2500 BC) and is shown in several reliefs in the temple of the Sun at Abusir. Tablets from the reign of Seti I (1314 to 1292) give a value of an ass or an ox to 110 pots of honey. Thutmoses III is recorded as receiving tributes of honey from Syria in 1450 BC.
The Indians used honey in religious rites. The Indian Laws of Manu, dating from 1000 BC, called for a tax of one-sixth of the beekeeper’s production.
Honey is sugary nectar of flowers gathered by bees. It is carried in “honey sacs” where enzymes begin the process breaking down the sugars. The bee then deposits her cargo into hexagonal wax cells, to provide nourishment for a young bee. Continued evaporation in the warm atmosphere of the hive gradually transforms the nectar into honey. Bees must travel thousands of miles to produce just one teaspoon of honey.
The saliva of bees breaks down the sucrose in flower nectar into the simple sugars fructose and dextrose. Honey consists of about 35-40 percent fructose and 30-35 percent dextrose along with 17-20 percent water and traces of pollen, wax, acids, proteins, enzymes, vitamins, minerals and pigments. Honey also contains gums, which are complex carbohydrates that contribute to the viscosity of honey–the more gums it contains, the thicker it will be. The flavor, texture and color of honey depend on the types of flowers that provide the original nectar.
Only careful and minimal processing will preserve the many nutritive benefits of honey. Honey should never be heated during extraction or the enzymes will be destroyed; nor should it be filtered. Honey should be thick and opaque. When it comes to honey, see-through is obscene.
Many health claims have been made for honey. Babylonian tables give recipes for “electuaries,” medicines based on honey. Pliny the Elder included powdered bees in a cure for dropsy and bladder stones. In Russia, beekeepers are noted for their longevity, and this is said to be due to their custom of eating the “honey from the bottom of the hive,” which contains high levels of “impurities” such as pollen, propolis and even bee parts.
Propolis is a resinous substance collected from various plants which the bees mix with wax and use in the construction of their hives. Extravagant health claims have been made for propolis and it has, in fact, been the subject of a number of studies. A 1992 study published in Chemical-Biological Interactions found that caffeic acid esters (which give propolis a sharp taste like cinnamon) in propolis have strong anticancer characteristics when tested on colon cancer cells.
Health claims are also made for bee pollen, claims which have been validated by at least one study. In 1948, the Journal of the National Cancer Institute reported that bee pollen fed to rats halted the proliferation of cancerous tumors. The best results occurred with only small dosages of pollen. This suggests that bee pollen is very powerful and so potent that even weak or small amounts are vigorous enough to affect the growth of cancerous tumors.
It is the pollen in unfiltered honey that is said to provide relief to allergy sufferers. Small amounts of pollen act as an inoculant against large amounts in the air that trigger reactions like the runny nose and itchy eyes of hayfever.
Unlike other sweeteners, honey is predigested and so is easy to digest. When consumed with carbohydrates, such as oatmeal or toast, the enzymes in honey help with the digestion of carbohydrates.
Since early times, man has made fermented drinks with honey. The most important was mead, an alcoholic beverage, enjoyed by the English and Russians. The word derives from the Sanskrit word for honey, which is madhu. A similar drink called t’ej is popular in Ethiopia.
What is less well known is the fact that honey itself can ferment, if it contains enough residual moisture and is left in a warm place–honey ferments but never spoils! Fermented honey actually expands somewhat, and develops rich flavors. It is an even better aid to digestion than regular honey.
The following recipes all call for raw, unfiltered honey, preferably fermented, and all involve lactic-acid fermentation to which the honey contributes. In all of them, the enzymes are preserved, as none require high temperatures to prepare.
Fermented Honey Crackers
Makes about 30 crackers
1/2 cup plain whole yoghurt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, preferably cultured
2 1/2 cups freshly ground wheat, spelt or Kamut® flour
1/4 cup fermented honey
1 teaspoon sea salt
unbleached white flour to prevent sticking
Leave butter at room temperature to soften. Mix yoghurt, butter, honey and salt together with an electric mixer. Gradually add the freshly ground flour. Form dough into a ball, place in a bowl and cover with a towel. Leave at room temperature for 12-24 hours.
Rub a 9-inch by 13-inch pyrex pan with butter and dust with white flour. Dust your hands with white flour to prevent sticking and then press the dough into the pan. Score with a knife so the dough will separately easily into rectangular “crackers.” Dehydrate by placing in an oven set at 150 degrees until the crackers dry out completely–this will take a day or two. Break into crackers and store in an air tight container in the refrigerator.
Honey Topping
Makes 1 1/2 cups
1 1/4 cup good quality cream, preferably raw
1 tablespoon cultured cream, such as creme fraiche
2 tablespoons fermented honey
1 tablespoon liqueur, such as cognac or armagnac
Mix all ingredients together with a wire whisk and place in a glass mason jar. Cover and leave at room temperature overnight, then refrigerate. The cream should become very thick when chilled. Use as a topping for fruit or other desserts.
Honey-Lemon Drink
Makes 2 quarts
1 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup fermented honey
1/2 cup homemade whey
1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg
filtered water
Mix honey with lemon juice and place in a 2-quart glass container. Add whey, grated nutmeg and water to fill the container. Cover tightly and leave at room temperature for 2-3 days. Transfer to the refrigerator and leave for 2-3 weeks. Serve plain or with added soda water.
Honey-Berry Beverage
Makes 2 quarts
2 cups blackberries, raspberries or boysenberries,
fresh or frozen
1/4 – 1/2 cup fermented honey
1/2 cup whey
2 teaspoons sea salt
filtered water
Place berries in a food processor and process with a little water until smooth. Pass through a strainer to remove the seeds. Blend with honey, whey and salt and place in a 2-quart glass container. Add enough water to fill the container. Cover and leave at room temperature for 2-3 days. Carefully remove any foam that rises to the top. Cover tightly and store in the refrigerator for several weeks. The sediment will fall to the bottom. To serve, pour out slowly so as not to disturb the sediment.
Sidebar
Fermented Honey Now Available
The Really Raw Honey company produces a wonderful raw, unfiltered honey from hives set in wildflowers along the eastern seaboard. Their product contains the pollens of goldenrod, wild asters, dandelion, May apple and St. John’s Wort and is both raw and unfiltered. They currently have a large stock of fermented honey available which may be ordered by calling (410) 675-7233.
This article appeared in Wise Traditions in Food, Farming and the Healing Arts, the quarterly magazine of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Fall 2000.
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I`m interested in making the honey beverage But would like to use fresh picked elderberries. I`ve read they have to be cooked first is that true?
Live, Love, & Laugh, Rita
is it normal for a Wild honey to bubble and have a sour taste?
Yes, natural honey could form small bubbles if in liquid form, it can even form a kind of white foam on top. As for the sour taste, that sounds strange….
Sour honey comes from a small wild bee called trigona bee or popularly called stingless bees. in the Philippines, stingless bees are natively called Kiwot, Lukot, Kiyot, Lukutan or Libog honey. Sierra Madre Wild Honey gatherers are the main suppliers of 10 different kinds of raw wild honey from 3 kinds of wild bees endemic to Philippine forests. These kinds are the following: Pisukan softwood wild honey, Pisukan hardwood wild honey, Liguan kahoy wild honey, Liguan bato honey, Liguan baboy wild honey, Liguan Sagada wild honey, Pichukan Mt. Apo North Cotabato wild honey, and Lukotan wild honey, Maya-Maya green wild honey, and Pisukan black wild honey. Interested? If you are ON-LINE you can visit its Facebook page. Just type: @sierramadrewildhoney, OR you can copy paste this URL link https://www.facebook.com/sierramadrewildhoney/ OR you can have a taste test at our Quezon City Metro Manila HONERY. We keep our raw wild honeys in barrels for a minimum of 3 years before it comes out wonderfully fermented. You can call +639334019888/+639166358111/+639201213333 when you are in Manila, Philippines.
My parents and grandparents used to do beekeeping as a hobby many years ago. That’s why I know a thing or two. I always tell friends that the most beneficial honey comes from the bottom of the hive, as it contains more of the nutrients inherent to honey, so I like that you’ve mentioned that in your article. By the way, as a nutritionist and honey consumer myself, I have created an informative article that’s about helping people recognize real honey from fake one, so that their money can be well-justified when they shop for this ancient super food. If some of you are curious about it, here it is: https://organicpowerfoods.com/health-topics/how-to-tell-if-honey-is-real
Hello – How do you ferment honey! I can not seem to get a straight answer from any one!
Cynthia
takes years in storage to ferment it
I have started a batch with fresh lemon slices, and it is bubbling away, and pulling the lemon flavor into the honey. Sliced lemons covered in raw honey in a quarte jar, witH a super cool fermentation lid, that allows for the gas to escape…takes about 10 days. Will make the honey more liquid/runny.-I hope that helps…
Would love to know which lid you’re using. Thanks!
Where in the article does it tell you how to ferment honey.
Thanks
That’s what I was looking for.
We have honey which fermented naturally within a few months of collecting frames from hives. We normally seal some frames from hives, and store some honey in original frames over winter months, for later consumption….and only taking enough caps off frame cells in each frame, for daily honey demand. In this manner framed honey seems to last a long time, unless it ferments. In one example some bees , without intent, were given access to some of our frames prior to us sealing them in tight containers… They had de-capped many ceels on these frames and the honey from those frames with opened honey cells seemed to absorb or get some moisture in it from humid and wet surrounding weather. Soon after these frames with re-opened cells fermented. I am told that honey taken on frames when cells have not been originally sealed by bee wax is inclined to also ferment. David
I use raw honey to ferment other fruits and alliums such as cranberries, garlic and ginger. The resulting honey seems to lose sweetness and density. Do you know if the sugars are reduced in the thinner honey? Does it alter the nutritional values
Of the honey and/ or the ferments? I ask because my wife is on a diet that mandates reduced sugar and carb intake.