Today is St Matthew's Day and traditions says it was the day when bee-hives were closed for the winter
St Matthew shuts up the bees
This small book all about honey is one I picked up for next to nothing from a car-boot sale in the summer, it turned out to be a fascinating little book, packed full of everything you ever wanted to know about honey.
There's a whole A-Z of the flavours of honey when it's been made from various plants and several pages of quotes about honey.
If you want to gather honey, don't kick over the beehive
Dale Carnegie
Tart words make no friends: a spoonful of honey
will catch more flies than a gallon of vinegar.
Benjamin Franklin
Did you know humans have been harvesting honey for at least 8,000 years, for most of those it's been taken from wild bees then came straw skeps, from which the whole combs would have been taken. Then wooden hives with purpose made removable frames that we see today and centrifugal honey extractors and honey production and harvesting became a lot safer and easier.
I bought this little skep shaped honey pot from a boot sale a few years ago, simply because I liked it. It's never been used for honey and sits on my bookshelves collecting dust!
The page below is from my book 'An English Country Year'
We never kept bees at the smallholding because of having people on the campsite and animals and because it's quite a complicated business which neither of us wanted to learn. Our neighbour over the road had beehives and we often swapped eggs for a jar of honey. Nowadays I always have a jar in the house bought locally from one of several local producers. I like it best on toast as a change from marmalade or in hot water with lemon and cinnamon for a cold cure. It's supposed to be good for burns and I've used it on burns from the oven shelves when I've not had an Aloe Vera plant but it's a sticky cure and I'm not sure it helps.
Back Soon
Sue
You know what else honey is good for? Dip your plant cuttings in it, Sue. It works just like the expensive rooting compounds. My sister taught me that trick.
ReplyDeleteNever heard of that before.
DeleteI see that little honey skep jar filled with the jar of honey you use now. How sweet it would be to dip the honey from that little jar for your toast in the morning. It would remind you of the happier days when you had the eggs you traded for the local honey.
ReplyDeleteWhat a sticky job it would be transferring honey from one to another!
DeleteI remember Diane kept bees and made her own honey for a while. She said the honey was lovely but it was complicated and turned out to be too much hassle really. Her bees and equipment all went to good homes in the end.
ReplyDeletexx
It's not a cheap hobby to start and so much simpler to buy a jar from a local bee keeper
DeleteAnd of course the Royal bee-keeper told the Queen's bees at Buckingham Palace and Clarence House the Queen was dead and King Charles was their new keeper. Strange traditions we observe.
ReplyDeleteTraditions are best kept - just in case
DeleteHoney is like dandelions. Hugely versatile and deeply valuable to society. Except many don't feel that way about dandelions, do they? There's a tremendous number of beekeepers in my area. I don't know how many hives the Queen's bee keeper had to go round to tell the bees that she had passed away. It made the news, for telling the bees is an important tradition.
ReplyDeleteI mowed round the dandelion plant in the grass earlier in the year but it disappeared in the drought
DeleteI drink a cup of hot water with a spoon of honey dissolved in it every night. It helps me sleep - and keeps things regular!
ReplyDeleteSounds like a lovely bedtime drink.
DeleteI love all things honey - like most things the cost of a jar of honey has risen but each sticky, tasty mouthful is worth every penny IMO
ReplyDeleteAlison in Wales x
£6 a pound now - up from £4 a couple of years ago. I like set honey best so it doesn't run off the toast!
DeleteAlan always had the intention of keeping bees but although he did courses and met up with local beekeepers, he never actually got around to it. The new owners of our Welsh house do have hives high on the hillside and when we visited they gifted Alan a very large tub of Isfryn honey.
ReplyDeleteThe varying colours of the bees pollen saddlebags always fascinate me; yellow, white, grey...
ReplyDeleteLooks like a lovely little book. So interesting.
ReplyDeleteI love the idea of telling the bees about major changes in the household.
ReplyDeleteMy Grandma and Grandpa used to come up to Missouri from Florida every fall just before Thanksgiving. Every morning I would sit at the kitchen table with them while the sun was just streaming in shining on their honey as they spooned it out of the jar and mixed it into the butter on their toast. The morning sun made it look like pure spun gold. I always wanted some so much and either Grandma or Grandpa would fix some for me on toast. I thought it was almost too pretty to eat. It tasted so good and sweet with my cold glass of milk. And every year about 20 minutes after eating that beautiful spun gold butter and honey, my stomach started cramping so bad and I would have to run to the bathroom and throw up. All day that day my stomach would ache. I tried the honey every year while Grandma and Grandpa came to the house for their fall visit and every time I had the same result. I tried it one more time when I was about 30 years old with the same result. So disappointing. I am 68 years old now and haven't tried it since that time I was 30, but I can still remember just how it gleamed golden as it drizzled off of the spoon as the sun shined through the kitchen window.
Different people live in my Mom and Dad's house now. I may sometime drive by and see them outside and tell them to be sure and have honey spooned from a glass jar on their morning toast while the sun is shining in through the window onto kitchen table.. It will be some of the prettiest food they will ever eat.
I am very fortunate to be able to order honey from my daughter-in-law's parents who keep bees in the Wirral. Before that we were supplied by local beekeepers who live in the next road to us. My friend also keeps bees on my herb sanctuary in the Cotswolds and we were gifted two jars "rent" for the first time this summer. I have used honey for a nasty burn caused when I tipped a whole saucepan of bolognaise sauce over my leg. The honey dries up any blisters and works really well. I spread the honey mixed with calendula and St John's wort oils onto a piece of torn sheet and wound it around my leg overnight. The blisters had disappeared by the morning and I had no scarring.
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