Honey is a sweet food made by bees using nectar from flowers. Honey offers antiseptic, antioxidant and cleansing properties for our body and health. Manuka honey is especially known to fight infection and aids tissue healing, it also helps reduce inflammation and scarring.
Honey can be beneficial if you have allergies and you eat honey that is local to your area, it may prevent your seasonal allergies. If you have a sore throat honey helps due to its natural anti-inflammatory effects and it will help to heal the wounds more quickly. Honey diluted in water can help with stomach aches and dehydration.
Honey comes in a variety of different forms. The main characteristics of these are described below:
Comb Honey - also known as cut comb honey. This is honey in its most pure form. A piece of beeswax comb is cut from the frame and is packaged as is. The wax capping over the cells keeps most honey in place. It is eaten with the wax in place and is sort of like a chewy lolly.
Raw Honey - The honey is extracted from its wax casing, then filtered before being packaged and usually contains small particles and flecks of honey comb bits, pollen, propolis etc. It can granulate and crystallise with time.
Honey that has granulated or crystallised can be heated gently to turn it back to liquid. Never microwave it! Put the honey container into a pot of water 3-5 mins after the water has boiled, stirring gently and remove form the heat as it turns back to a liquid.
Liquid Honey - Most of the honey in the supermarkets is liquid honey. It is filtered more, to remove all of the little bits found in raw honey, and it is pasteurised (heated to 70 degrees Celsius then rapidly cooled) to prevent fermentation and delay crystallisation. It has a 'cleaner' look than raw honey.
Creamed Honey - Also, known as whipped honey or spun honey. It has had the crystallisation process precisely controlled. It is one part granulated honey blended with nine parts liquid honey. This process does not affect the taste and it has the same nutritional qualities as liquid honey.
Honey Shortbread Recipe
200g Butter
300g Flour (Can mix 50/50 wholemeal & white if you want more fibre)
50g Rice Flour (Worth adding as it gives a nice crispness to shortbread)
50g Honey (If you want a stronger taste use Manuka or Rewarewa, but if you want some sweetness without the strong honey taste go for Clover, Borage or light pastoral honey.)
Rub the butter into the flour and rice flour until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Add the honey and work together to form a dough. If the mixture is a bit dry add a little more honey. Knead I gently, You can roll and press into a baking tin or roll into a square. Keep the square an even thickness so they cook evenly. Lightly score before baking then cut through completely once by baked - this prevents them splintering.
Bake at 150C for approximately 45 minutes. You want them a light golden colour not brown.
