"The only reason for being a bee that I know of is making honey ... and the only reason for making honey is so I can eat it," Winnie the Pooh declares in "The House at Pooh Corner." What dear Winnie doesn't realize, however, is that not only do real bears not actively eat honey (they eat bee larvae inside the hive instead), but the bees themselves have another quite crucial purpose in life -- flower pollination! Sure, honey's role as a self-made bee energy source is vital to the success of the hive, but bees' ability to pollinate is of much greater importance to humans: Without bee pollination, we wouldn't have many of the fruits and vegetables -- not to mention plant diversity -- that we take for granted. But the processes of bee pollination and honey production find common ground in the creation of monofloral, or one-flower, honeys, of which there is as much diversity in taste and use as within the Plant Kingdom itself.
Long revered as a natural sugar, honey was the sweetener of choice before the advent of refined sugar. Although its sweetening role has been usurped in the mass markets, honey still appeals to bakers for its ease in browning baked goods and to advocates of holistic medicine for its intrinsic antibacterial properties. But this bee product is often seen solely as an additive rather than a standalone ingredient. Cue the music for the entrance of monofloral honeys and their myriad of flavors. With these single-flower species honeys, honey has risen in status to that of a fine wine, ripe with complex individual characters stemming from its source flowers or trees, as well as its geographic origins.
To make monofloral honeys, beekeepers locate hives near stands of one type of tree or flower and then astutely time their blooming to coordinate it with honey harvesting. Although this sounds precisely calculated, beekeepers benefit from the natural staggering of blooming times among these diverse flower species, which then allows for multiple monofloral honey harvests in one season. Don't be fooled, though -- unless produced in a vacuum-like environment, such as a greenhouse, no monofloral honey is really ever 100 percent derived from a single species of flower. Scientific testing can prove a monofloral honey to have originated from a certain flower species, but taste is really the simplest layman's test to determine a honey's origin.
Virginia really stands out in terms of local monofloral honey production. Go to any farmers market, specialty store or honey producer in the area and you're bound to see at least four or five varieties of monofloral honey from within a 100-mile radius. At the Greenwood Market, a small specialty shop in Crozet, the honey from Golden Angels Apiaries in Linville fills up an entire vertical shelving unit. Various sizes of liquid, chunk and comb honey containers line the shelves, all filled with raw honey. Just as an aside, raw honey, which is unfiltered and still contains all of the natural enzymes and bioflavonoids, is preferable to refined honey. Available at supermarkets, refined honey is ultrafiltered and heated to about 170 degrees, which kills all the healthful enzymes in the tradeoff of prolonging shelf life. In contrast, Golden Angels Apiaries' honey, like any raw honey, is only heated to a low temperature and is sought by local pollen allergy sufferers. This honey is available in five monofloral varieties, representing a mix of local flora:
*Thistle honey is fairly light and works well in baked goods due to its mellow, not overpowering flavor.
*Clover honey is pretty much the same as you'd find commercially available in the grocery store, except that the raw version is much more flavorful.
*Poplar is a mild honey that has become somewhat rare since tulip trees flower early in the season and can get hit by frost. Get it while you can.
*Orange blossom honey transcends geographic lines, available not only in Virginia but throughout the United States and even abroad, like in Greece. This mild honey is delicious spread on baked goods or topped on yogurt.
*Tupelo is a very light honey that is fairly resistant to crystallization because of its high sugar content. It's best to use this rich honey sparingly, although it works well as a tea sweetener.
*A sixth variety, wildflower honey, is a potent syrup derived from all of the summer wildflowers from which bees draw nectar.
Whatever your preference, local honeys represent a host of complex flavors and reveal the bee's process from flower pollination to honey production. I think it's safe to say that if Winnie the Pooh had a more discerning palette, he'd be astounded by the diversity of flower and tree blossom types embodied within monofloral honey.
Nora's column runs biweekly Wednesdays. She can be reached at nwhite@cavalierdaily.com.
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