Flavored Honey Recipes

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Permalink Reply by Fireflick on October 30, 2012 at 2:12am

Those are wonderful flavors to add to the honey, I particularly like the rosemary, but I was wondering does anyone know how to go about flavoring honey with fruit. I have tried several ways in the past and mine always seem to be a bit off tasting and they never seem to keep very long either.

Permalink Reply by Traveler on October 30, 2012 at 2:45pm

There are different types of flavored honey. The natural kind is when the bees use a particular pollen source, like orange trees, to make their honey. But then you can also create other types of flavored honey by infusing regular honey with a flavoring agent. Flavored honey is a great gift and is easy to make.

You can use flavored honey as you would regular honey. It can be used on your breakfast biscuits or to sweeten your coffee or tea. One really popular way to use flavored honey is in honey straws.

The basic concept of each of these methods is to heat the honey and flavor together for a short time and then allow them to sit before straining out the large particles.
Ingredients

All recipes call for 1 cup of honey, flavoring, saucepan and an 8-ounce glass jar with lid.

Start by pouring the cup of honey into the saucepan. You can multiply these recipes if you need more. Heat the honey and the flavoring for 10 minutes on a low heat. Stir while heating. You don't want to boil or scorch the mixture, only heat it enough to release the flavor of the ingredient (between 100° and 120° F, or 38°-50° C). After heating and mixing allow the flavored honey to sit for 1 to 2 hours. The longer you let it sit, the stronger the flavor will be. Experiment to see how long you need, but 2 hours is recommended.
Suggested Flavorings

Mint
1/4 cup of chopped mint leaves

Citrus
1 tablespoon of the grated peel. This could be lemon, orange, grapefruit or other citrus fruit.

Ginger
1 tablespoon julienne ginger root.

Cinnamon
4 cinnamon sticks.

Fruit Flavors
You can add strawberries, blueberries, apples or just about any other fruit to the honey. Use 2 tablespoons of diced fruit.
Straining

Use a kitchen strainer for straining the honey. It will be easier to strain if you heat the honey again slightly to make it more runny. Other than the texture and looks, there is nothing wrong with leaving bits of the flavoring in the final product.

Pour the flavored honey into jars to give as gifts or use on your own.