The Word of the Week is honey. The hardworking bees & beekeepers have done their work and as the weather turns cold, it's time to think about ways to can use all that Michigan honey! The Michigan Department of Agriculture says that Michigan's annual honey production of 5 million pounds make it the 9th largest honey producer in the US. You can find lots more about Michigan honey from the Michigan Beekeeper's Association, including this excellent look at the Beekeeper's Year.
Honey and honeybees have been in the news a lot recently because of Colony Collapse Disorder. Some of the leading research on this is being done at MSU, and you can fly over to cyberbee.net to learn more about what's being done (be sure to click over Bees4Kids for some fast bee facts!).
Dancing Crane Honey by Lisa Leutheuser
(aka "Kitchen Chick")
The blog Kitchen Chick features some great recipes using honey - my favorite is Fried Eggplant with honey, mint, and sesame seeds. Today she also has a great post on the Dancing Crane Honey Farm of Ann Arbor. During her tour, Lisa took a taste test of several local honeys and one off-the-shelf, mass market honey. She writes:
Let me say: the taste difference between raw honey and generic pasteurized grocery store honey is immediately obvious. Each of the local raw honeys was full of different floral flavors, beautiful on the tongue, and a pleasure to eat plain or on a cracker.
You can find farms producing honey & honey products in Northwest Michigan at Taste the Local Difference (and all across Michigan at Absolute Michigan keyword honey) and get a whole lot more honey recipes from Better Bee Honey of the Thumb region. You'll find a few honey pics and a whole lot more bee photos in the Absolute Michigan pool on Flickr - add your own!
Something we missed? Post it in the comments!
2 Comments
This is a great site. I have been using it recently to show my class of 4th graders how beautiful the UP is (along Lake Superior) via Lar's photo gallery! There is so much to look at here. I think I have only seen a "tip of the iceberg".
JT
Jane, your comment really warms my heart.
A big part of the reason we do Absolute Michigan is to share our love of Michigan with folks. I think that it's so cool that you're sharing Absolute Michigan with your students!
Thanks!!
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