Chocolate Bakalava by Let’s Taco Bout It Blog

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Anna Karenina, baklava, beekeeping, chocolate, food, honey, recipe

Istoriya Odin

This recipe first published at: Let’s Taco Bout It Blog. Visit the link below to read entire article. get the recipe, and see some amazing pictures.

“He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun, yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.”

― Leo Tolstoy , Anna Karenina

The Princess Oblonsky, also know as Anna Arkádyevna Karénina or even more familiarly Anna, looked curiously for and back the immense banquet table. Being nobility afforded many luxuries for her and her inquisitive and thoughtful mind enjoyed these luxuries to the fullest. She adored the ability to sit and enjoy a meal with her family and friends, however this grand hall full of people she barely knew was a bit much. The fakery, the frippery of it all insulted her sensibilities to their very core. The grandiose hall was modeled after the glorious summer palace in Versailles, the very height of couture and society. Twinkling tapers softly lit the entire guilted corridor with candelabras, tapestries and chandeliers glittering. All at once it was to much to behold, yet Anna drank it in like champagne.

Even more than the grand room was the grand foods! Each aristocrat had multiple gourmet courses served and each was whisked away by the Tatar attendants in coattails down to the backs of their knees once the dish had been finished. In between, Anna and the other guests had time to discourse on the favorite topics of the evening the food, the military, and their fellow aristocrats. While the nobles around her were distracted by the gossip, she wandered off to examine the sideboards full of stylish desserts. There were all of the nouveau delicacies from Paris, but as Anna continued until she found her absolute favorite, baklava. This decadent, delicate pastry was layered with honey and nuts and to add a bit of the french flair that the Russians adored so much, the whole sweet was studded with bits of melted chocolate.

As Anna finished browsing, she returned to her seat thinking only of how her son would have loved the baklava. Abruptly, she realized she had been staring down and across the table, with a young man smiling back at her. Anna shook her head to clear her thoughts and joined in the conversation with the man to her left but every time she looked up, there was the rakish grin. It’s was as hard to resist smiling back as it was to not have a piece of the baklava!

(cont.)

Read entire article, see some amazing photos and get the recipe at:  Chocolate Baklava – Anna Karenina — Let’s Taco Bout It Blog

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Thank Bees for Your Thanksgiving Dinner by Married with Bees

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food, pollination, Thanksgiving

Millions of Americans are about to celebrate Thanksgiving, and the grocery stores are bracing themselves for the onslaught of customers.  The fact that hundreds of millions of people in the US can eat a meal that consists of roughly the same menu on the same day is a miracle of modern agriculture as well as a testament to good supply chain management at that nations’ grocery stores.  Have you ever considered how your Thanksgiving meal is impacted by bees?  Many of your Thanksgiving favorites would not make it to the table without the pollination services provide by bees.

Let’s consider a typical Thanksgiving meal that consists of the following: turkey, stuffing, yeast rolls, green bean casserole, cranberry relish, pumpkin pie and coffee.  How would the menu be impacted if there were no bees?

Cont.

Read the full article here: Thank Bees for Your Thanksgiving Dinner — Married with Bees

Raw Honey for Good Dogs by Knotty Toys for Good Dogs

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beekeeping, food, honey

I think everyone loves honey, it’s so sweet & delicious. But it’s also very good for dogs. Suzie Q & I get a teaspoon of raw honey every day. To be clear, I’m talking only about raw, unpasteurized honey & not the processed honey you usually would find at the supermarket. Raw honey is rich […]

Read more here:  Raw Honey for Good Dogs — Knotty Toys for Good Dogs

Does the Truth Matter? by Bad Beekeeping Blog

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beekeeping, food, honey, safety

I’m back in Canada after a week in Europe. It’s cooler here (21C today) than Hungary’s 39C. It’s been much too dry on the western Canadian prairies – that’s probably going to hurt the honey crop and maybe even the millions of acres of wheat, lentils, and canola in our area. It’s already August, so […]

Read complete article at:  Does the Truth Matter? — Bad Beekeeping Blog

Is this RAW Honey?

Tags

beekeeping, food, honey

Excellent write up on the topic of raw honey. Many, if not most, of my customers ask for specifically “raw honey” for the health benefits. They often have many requirements such as non-filtered, non-heated, and local sourced. This article by The Apiarist explores the topic of raw honey.

Source: ‘Raw’ honey — The Apiarist

How many times have your been asked that?

Define ‘raw’

Chambers 21^st Century Dictionary defines ‘raw’ as meaning: 1. said of meat, vegetables, etc: not cooked. 2. not processed, purified or refined. … and then wanders off into definitions of ‘raw’ silk, weather and wounds, though no mention of raw honey.  Clearly honey is both a foodstuff and ‘not cooked’, though if it’s heated excessively it has to be sold as ‘Bakers honey’.

However, is it processed, purified or refined? I operate my extractor with the gate open. I run the honey through a coarse filter (~2 mm) directly into 30 lb. buckets. This removes the worst of the lumps that really shouldn’t be in honey … big pellets of pollen, scraps of brace comb and bits of bees. I really don’t want any of these on my toast in the mornings, and I don’t want them floating on the – inevitable – scum when the jar is opened as I would really like to attract repeat customers. I store the 30 lb. buckets until I’m ready to jar the honey, re-filtering it through a fine mesh and removing the scum before bottling. The end product looks great and has a good shelf life.

Since ‘purified’ means to remove contaminants I suspect the pedantic would consider the honey is no longer raw.

Raw honey on labels

Honey labelled for sale must carry one of the following reserved words that describe the product … Honey, Blossom Honey, Nectar Honey, Honeydew Honey, Comb Honey, Chunk Honey, Cut Comb in Honey, Drained Honey, Extracted Honey, Pressed Honey, Filtered Honey and Baker’s Honey. If the predominant nectar source is known the reserved word can be prefixed with the source e.g. heather honey.

It’s notable that raw, organic, unfiltered or unheated aren’t reserved words and yet are regularly found on honey labels, sometimes immediately preceding the word ‘honey’.

The taste test

The jar at the top of the page is coarse filtered ‘raw’ honey run straight from the extractor into the bottle. It’s slightly cloudy and has bubbles and a sort of swirly, almost birefringent, appearance when you hold it against the light. It will almost certainly crystallise unevenly and unpredictably. It might have an antenna lurking in its murky depths.

It tastes absolutely delicious.

But then so is honey that’s been allowed to settle in the buckets, gently warmed in a honey warming cabinet^†, filtered through a fine mesh filter, allowed to settle again, skimmed (to remove the bubbles that rise to the surface) and then carefully bottled in pre-warmed jars. This is still ‘raw’ – as in uncooked – honey but it’s also certainly a more refined product. It’s beautifully clear, it looks great on the shop shelves or the breakfast table, it sells well and it attracts a premium price. Like all pure honey that hasn’t been heated to very high temperatures or filtered excessively it will eventually crystallise, but it has a long shelf life and will remain attractive for the duration.

It might be interesting to conduct a blind taste test of a jar of ‘raw’ honey with one refined just enough – as described above – to look really good and sell well. It might also be interesting to auction an unlabelled jar of each and see which is more attractive to the customer … or see whether customers who find bee legs in the jar make repeat orders

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^† Going by the number of visitors who come to this site having searched for a ‘honey warming cabinet‘ I suspect that the ‘raw’ honey sold by most beekeepers is at least partially refined. As an aside that last link also takes you to details of the cabinet sold by Abelo’s, which looks lovely (a lot more aesthetically pleasing than my DIY effort), but costs an eye-watering £599 and doesn’t enable you to pre-warm supers before extraction. A missed opportunity.

 

Read more at:  ‘Raw’ honey — The Apiarist

Sweet and Spicy Chicken Wings

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beekeeping, food, honey, recipe

Those that have been reading my blog for a while know that I cannot resist chicken wings. I wanted to try another Asian style chicken wing, so this is a cross between honey sriracha and orange chicken. I made these fairly mild because my son can’t handle the heat. But if these were just for […]

via Sweet and Spicy Chicken Wings — Joann’s Food For Thought

Make your own “golden milk”—warm turmeric spiced milk with honey.

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beekeeping, food, honey, recipe

I’ve noticed an increased interest in blog posts containing honey recipes. I share that interest. So, going forward I’ll make Saturday mornings, Honey Recipe Day! If you’re like many people the weekend gives you the opportunity to shop the market and experiment with recipes. Let’s see how this works. If you really enjoy honey recipes I also host a FaceBook Group dedicated to honey recipes titled, Raw Local Honey Recipes. Come visit!

Source: Make your own “golden milk”—warm turmeric spiced milk with honey. RECIPE: http://vwell.cm/2l1Bnlx by @savor_health

By Stephanie Lang, MS, RDN, CDN, at Savor Health

Total Time 5 min
Prep 2 min, Cook 3 min
Yield 1 cup (120 calories)

Try this warming beverage for a mid-morning or mid-afternoon snack, or as a pre-bedtime drink. The mix of spices—turmeric, cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves—gives the drink a sweet flavor and the drinker a gentle, relaxing sensation. Honey and vanilla help sweeten this drink just a touch, so you can feel like you are drinking a latte.

Research on specific spices and their role in cancer prevention is still ongoing. Many studies find significant results when the spices are consumed in large amounts or doses. This can be hard to do in everyday life, and potentially dangerous, as large doses of spices may interact with certain medications.

Turmeric is one spice which has been extensively studied, with more than thousands of lab studies published over the past few decades. Clinical trials are currently examining the role that turmeric may have in cancer prevention. In general, use small amounts of spices in your cooking to enhance the flavor of your food (and drink) and provide some potential cancer preventing properties in the long run.

Ingredients

• 1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/16 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1 cup low-fat milk
• 1/2 teaspoon honey
• 1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation

1. Mix together the spices in a small bowl and set aside.
2. Warm the milk on the stove top over medium heat.
3. Stir in the honey and vanilla and cook another 30 seconds. Add the spices, stir, and warm for another 30 seconds.
4. Pour into a mug and serve.

Ingredient Variations and Substitutions

Want even more heat to this spiced beverage? Add a few grinds of black pepper to the mixture for a subtle yet delicious extra spice.

To turn this warming beverage into a meal, stir in half a cup of rolled oats and simmer for 5 minutes. You will have a delicious spiced oatmeal breakfast full of soluble fiber, protein, and whole grain goodness.

Cooking and Serving Tips

To keep your spices fresh, purchase them in small sizes (this is especially important for spices that you do not use frequently) and label them with the date that you first open them. Toss any spices that have been sitting in your cabinet for more than one to two years. After a while, spices tend to lose their flavor or go rancid due to their high oil content. Store spices in a cool, dark area of the kitchen.

Source: Make your own “golden milk”—warm turmeric spiced milk with honey. RECIPE: http://vwell.cm/2l1Bnlx by @savor_health