Honey

[Brandi]

I got a honey ginger green tea for christmas! it is my favorite right now. But this week I am all about the fresh honey roasted peanut butter i ground at the healthfood store. OMG! It so yummy! i made cookies with it yesterday and had to give half away so I wouldn't eat them all!

[whippetgirl]

We have a beehive in our backyard which we got because I wanted to increase the yield in my vegetable/citrus garden. Wow, what a difference and of course the honey is a nice plus. Honey really differs in different areas depending on the time of year and the plants. I want to second the recommendation of the hawaiian honey....it is amazingly delicious and unlike any other honey I have ever tasted.
My DH suits up in the "beesuit" and tends to the bees. For those of you who don't want to do- it- yourselves, you can contact your local beekeepers group who often will be happy to leave one (or more) of their hives in your yard. By the way: the bees (or the girls, as we call them) are Italian honey bees and so very gentle! I can work in my garden while they are working with no worries.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

...the bees (or the girls, as we call them) are Italian honey bees and so very gentle! I can work in my garden while they are working with no worries.

That's so lovely!

(do they Buzzz in Italian?)

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

OK, so I've eaten my way through a 1/2 lb. chunk of local honeycomb over the past three days...Attachment 2495

[Offthegrid]

I can work in my garden while they are working with no worries.

You are braver than I!

[DarcyInOregon]

There is also a company that makes cosmetics, creams, lotions and such from bee stuff. The products are reasonably priced and of high quality. The company is Burt's Bees. Here is the link:

http://www.burtsbees.com

I use the eye cream they make out of royal jelly. I like their lip balm, and I use a lot of it because of doing you know what outside all the time, with the wind blowing against my face.

Sometimes I see a few of the Burt Bee products for sale at a pharmacy like Walgreens, or at a grocery store like Thriftway. I imagine some of the products are sold at the whole/natural food stores also.

I am interested in other members' recommendations regarding honey products. Any links?

[crazycanuck]

The honey stingers look ymmy and would love to order some over the net however...would they make it through Australian Quarantine??? I know i can't bring NZ honey to Aust & vice versa..hmmmm...

Off to email the nice quarantine folks...

BTW-which honey stingers are the best? The chocolate ones look yummmmy...

c

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Yeah the honey stingers look good, but are kind of expensive. Hmm...I could either buy two cartons of honey stingers....or I could buy another merino base layer!

Darcy- I used Burt's lip balm for YEARS every day, I just loved it. Then one day I put it on and suddenly out of the blue it felt all burning and my lips got all red and swollen and it was horrible! I looked awful- the red swelling even extended around beyond the edge of my lips! I stopped using it for several days and it took like 3 days for my lips to feel and look normal again. Then I put just a bit on to see if it was really the Burt's doing it, and BOOM! lips immediately swelled up all red and burning again! I then did some internet research and found a couple other women who had used it for years and then suddenly became allergic to it with the exact same symptoms. I think it's the peppermint essential oil or another essential oil in it, nothing to do with bee-ish ingredients. After that I have only used lip balms without essential oils and I seem to be fine. The only other time I've had an allergic reaction to anything was last summer to some PABA sunscreen- gave me BOILS all over my neck and back! Had to switch to sunscreen with only titanium oxide as the active ingredient, and all natural types.

[emily_in_nc]

A few honey products: Bath and Body Works. I was given one of the Le Couvent des Minimes body balms, and it smells and looks just like honey. Makes my hands smell luscious. I really do have to remind myself not to start licking my fingers!

Burt's Bees is made near where I work, in Durham, NC. I'm partial to them because they're local and natural and seem to be a very good company, but most of their products aren't heavy on the honey that I've noticed. They do use a lot of beeswax, though. And I love their lipbalm (no allergies yet).

Emily

[mudmucker]

I use honey from a local apiary very close to me and I love it. Not only am I supporting my local farmer which I try to do as much as I can, but the honey is raw and unprocessed with the comb and is delicious. The product never has been warmer than the temperature naturally occurring in a bee hive and basically retains all the pollen, enzymes, and minerals and well, everything but the bees. I too have heard like light_sabe_r, that if you take a tsp of local honey you can abate some allergies because of resistance building to the pollen in your area.

Another product I am trying, not local obviously, is using brown rice syrup. It is a gluten-free, wheat-free product that is sweet, but not as sweet as honey. I use it in the homemade granola bars I make for my bike rides, in smoothies and in some cooking. I want to try making my own GU for my bike rides and know that if you use karo syrup and other recommended sweeteners the glucose content can cause dramatic insulin surges in addition to consistency changes. I haven't determined yet if the brown rice syrup would cause similar surges.

[massbikebabe]

Use Burt's Bee's in some form every morning...love the stuff. Found it while skiing in Vermont and now my local grocery sells it!! Hand cream very greasy, foot cream best ever. You can also find it at drugstore.com





karen

[KnottedYet]

Lisa - I'm amazed your 1/2 lb of honeycomb lasted 3 days! I used to be able to get it pretty cheap, and we'd eat it from a spoon or spread the comb on bread (the wax melted on toast and really added to the taste and texture!)

I've started having problems with Burt's Bees minty lip balm. And I've loved it and used it for years! Enough people must be sensitive to the mint that BB has come up with a "honey" lip balm. I saw some at the store, but didn't buy a tube to try yet. No minty oils. http://www.burtsbees.com/webapp/wcs/...ubCategory=yes

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Lisa - I'm amazed your 1/2 lb of honeycomb lasted 3 days! I used to be able to get it pretty cheap, and we'd eat it from a spoon or spread the comb on bread (the wax melted on toast and really added to the taste and texture!)

I've started having problems with Burt's Bees minty lip balm. And I've loved it and used it for years! Enough people must be sensitive to the mint that BB has come up with a "honey" lip balm. I saw some at the store, but didn't buy a tube to try yet. No minty oils. http://www.burtsbees.com/webapp/wcs/...ubCategory=yes

Hi Knot,
Actually, i'll confess...the 1/2 lb of honeycomb did last me 3 days...but only because I didn't eat any the first day! So I really "ate" it in two days. I just dig into it with a spoon and skip the part about putting it ON anything...though your melted wax toast description sounds tempting!

Yeah, I used Burt's lip balm for YEARS several times a day- I loved it! Then that violent reaction happened all of a sudden. Weird.
Thanks for pointing out their new Honey Lip Balm- I didn't know about it! I suspect the problem for me WAS the peppermint oil. But both balms also contain rosemary extract- which would make me only try a tiny bit at first, in case it was THAT that my lips developed an allergy to, and not the peppermint. I'll spring for a HoneyBalm tube and check it out...I can always give it to my daughters if I react to it.
By the way...it is FUN to play with the fluttering bee on the Burt's webpage you link to!!! Keep playing with him with your mouse and he will eventually go hide in his hive. He'll stay there until you touch the hive withyour mouse pointer again, then he'll come out again to "play". COOL.

Knot, I REALLY like that funky "bee lady super hero" picture I attached to my first post in the thread. Do you think it would be dorky for me to use it as my TE avatar?? Tell me the truth now, I can take it. It don't want all the ohter chicks secretly laughing at me!

[KnottedYet]

USE IT AS YOUR AVATAR!!!!!

Please, please, it would "bee" so cool!

Do it.... you know you want to! (and you can always switch it back later)

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I did it!

Thank for encouraging my inner goof-ness.