I now have an obsession with collecting bee products
I have 1 kg of propolis, 15 kg of beeswax, 6 kg of honey
Now I need to get some bee pollen and royal jelly
Be careful, collecting bee products can be very addictive… I know I’ve been there, I’m on the road to recovery.
Seeing how this thread generated interest, I would like to share a few more things…
Bee pollen is a great health tonic. In the winter months, it can really give us sunlight in the body !
It is packed with micro-nutrients, vitamins and protein. Use moderately, it is dense food and it takes a lot of work from the bees.
Royal Jelly is a superfood also. It is the reason why an ordinary bee larvae can become a queen.
The jelly is packed around the larvae in a ‘shell’ comb that looks like a peanut.
Once you remove the larvae, the waxy shell can be kept in the fridge and a little jelly taken daily. Only a tiny drop at the end of a toothpick is sufficient dosage.
Bees are pheremonal creatures, the queen exudes a citronellol and geraniol like scent to make her presence known.
We can detect a little of that in the royal jelly.
In every part of the hive, there are different smells depending on the time of year and activity from the bees.
When you open a hive on a hot summer day, it is intoxicating…the smell is so hard to describe…
Sweet, flowery, musky, hay, coumarinic, phenolic, animalic….very complex, clean and refined.
I have not seen an extract or absolute that can come close.
I’ve tried many processes and solvents…I’ve come to the conclusion that it is very hard to extract those smells for perfumery.
As I’ve mentionned before, I use Poplar bud abs. or Labdanum for a better propolis note.
Here are some honeys that are worth a mention because of their special character.
Golden Rod: Dark amber honey with a distinct sweet nectar smell and a mineral undertone.
It is the honey collected at the end of summer as provisions for the winter. A good beekeeper will leave most of it to the bees.
The honey won’t crystalize easily.
Blueberry: Beekeepers travel with their hives and bring them in the remote boreal bog plains.
Wild blueberries are abundant there, and it is sort of a wild crop with minimal human intervention.
To maintain good production in the remote north, they provoke wildfires, which stimulates the blueberries and they rent hives to assure a good pollination. Other than that, it is wild ‘grown’. Boreal berries are smaller but they are packed with taste.
The honey is reddish light brown, with an aroma of ripe fruits, spices and slight camphor. It has a ‘medicinal’ smell.
Buckwheat: A very dark, almost black honey with a boozy molasses smell. Also has strong mineral facet.
This honey is very nutritious and medicinal. It is used by northern people for skin problems and as a rejuvenating face mask.
Alfalfa: light amber and quite fluid since it is a summer honey.
Delicate taste and aroma, smells like a field of northern wildflowers. Not overpowering, subtle.
Orange: light orange to yellow honey, very fluid because of warm climate.
It has a divine smell and taste, it feels like drinking neroli hydrosol. It is the honey that comes closest to the smell of the actual flowers it came from.
Buyer beware : in tourist markets around the world, this honey is often imitated. They take high fructose corn syrup and a few flavors molecules and make something that is surprisingly close to the real thing. They’ll even go as far as putting bee wings and dirt in the product to make it look authentic. But pay close attention, the real honey has a little foam on the surface and will behave differently than corn syrup.
You will find the real deal in the markets where the locals shop…
Coffee: reddish orange honey, very fluid. It is out of this world….very hard to describe.
The aroma is very ‘plumeria’ like and the taste is ‘super tropical fruit medley’.
I can’t put words to it, you have to try it. Beware, the real honey is somewhat rare which is why there are lots of imitations.
Mesquite: amber color honey, always crystalised. The taste is light and well balanced. I find it lightly smells of carob.
Mayan jungle honey: Amber color, very fluid honey.
It can change a lot depending on the seasons, but this honey has a very characteristic signature.
It tastes like citrus fruits, slightly sour, but there’s a rich cacao note that comes in afterwards. (raw beans, not chocolate)
It smells very exotic, like you’re eating a tropical fruit salad with a flower necklace around your neck.
I could go on, but these are the ones I thought were worth mentioning.
Word of caution:
The products of the bees are very concentrated in nature. The bees work really hard to gather and preserve the summer abundance.
So use them responsibly…
For thoses wanting to try africanized bee honey, just go easy on the first doses.
I have been stung countless times, so my body didn’t react to the honey.
But my son and my wife woke up the next day with a really swollen face and it was worrisome since we were far away in the middle of the jungle.
