Four Surprising Honey Facts

Many people know that honey can be used for medicinal purposes or as a tasty topping, but there is so much more to honey that most people are never introduced to. Here are a few facts you may not know about honey that can be easily used as conversational pieces at your next cocktail party! 1. Honey was of great value in ancient civilizations. Not only was honey used as a sweetener and to help promote good health, but it could be found in furniture polish, varnish, and even cement. In fact, honey once was so great in value that: In 30th century B.C. Egypt, honey was often used as payment or tribute and fed to sacred animals; In 7th century B.C. Greece, honey was used as a sacred offering to gods and spirits of the dead; In 11th century A.D. Germany, peasants were required to give their feudal lords a payment of both honey and beeswax. 2. Honey stored in airtight containers has an indefinite shelf life. Honey has a number of attributes designed to prevent it from spoiling (as long as it has been properly sealed). For example, the supersaturation of honey kills bacteria and also prevents yeast and other fungal spores from forming. Since honey doesn’t go bad, and considering how valuable honey was in ancient civilizations, edible honey (as well as honey combs) have been found in tombs thousands of years old. 3. A typical beehive of 50,000 honey bees can make up to 500 pounds of honey per year. In order to make just one pound (or 0.45 kilogram) of honey, two million flowers have...

Seven Tasty Honey Varietals for Meads

Making mead is a tricky business since creating a consistent product can prove to be difficult when you’re heavily dependent upon flowers and the hard-working population of honeybees. Depending on the time of year, honey tastes different due to varying nectar sources used for pollination. For example, honey produced earlier in the year may come from wildflowers rather than berries (you could call this mutt honey, since bee keepers aren’t sure which flowers bees are visiting of the many different types of wildflowers available to bees at this time!). Since honeys produced from different crops naturally have different flavours, mead makers strive to determine the best ways to incorporate seasonal flavours into their product lines. It’s also important to know that even nectar from the same location may vary in taste depending on rainfall and temperature. With hundreds of unique varieties available with their own strengths and weaknesses, there is a honey out there for everyone to enjoy. For example, honey varietals available in Canada include (but are not limited to): Alfalfa — everyday table honey Blueberry — sauces and baked goods Buckwheat — BBQ sauces and baked goods Canola — honey is mild with a peppery flavour to it Fireweed — dessert honey since it is very sweet Purple Loosestrife — greenish in colour White Sweet Clover — sweet, flowery flavour If you don’t know exactly what variety of honey you have, the general rule of thumb is that light-coloured honey tends to be milder in taste while dark-coloured honey tends to be...

Getting Our Buzz On at the 2nd Annual Fredericton Craft Beer Festival

On March 8th, 2014, we showcased our Pollen Angels product line at the second annual Fredericton Craft Beer Festival. With over 100 different beers (and other treats, including our mead) and over 1,000 attendees, there was no shortage of delicious drinks for all. With admission options for VIPs and VIP women’s-only events, the FCBF has already grown drastically from its first year and we were thrilled to attend the festival for our launch, serving six different flavors of mead all night long. For many attendees, it was their first time tasting mead! The event was hugely popular, selling out a month beforehand and bringing attendees and exhibitors from across Canada. Proceeds were donated to Team Diabetes that totalled more than $15,200 between ticket sales and a Beer for a Year draw. CTV News even did a special segment on the festival, which you can find online here: http://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=303282 While at the festival, we handed out samples of six mead flavours from our Pollen Angels product line, including: Queen’s Nectar Raspberry Kiwi Blueberry Apple Cranberry Maple Green Tea Iced Tea According to the reactions from our audience, Queen’s Nectar and Cranberry Maple were the fan favourites, although all of our flavours were handed out just as quickly with very positive responses as well. We can safely say that our products were a hit that evening with many attendees coming back to try each and every flavour. In fact, the attendees were so eager that we were bone-dry by the end of the night. There were times when the lines were 8-people deep as our busy bee workers served their hearts out. To...