THE BUSY BEE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 933, 28 June 1957, Page 22

THE BUSY BEE

subject of honey that I realised how really busy the bee is. I found that each worker-bee has to carry 500 times her own weight in nectar back to the hive before nightfall each day, and that three times as much nectar must be gathered as the amount of 2 was only quite lately when reading afresh on the

honey finally produced. tf hope my information is correct, What a good thing bees never go on strike! Honey is a most important natural food, and probably the oldest. It is the finest of the carbohydrates, requires no digestion, is easily assimilated, contains vital minerals and is a splendid and very quick stimulant. It should really be as much in daily use as salt or milk, and it should be one of the basic articles in the pantry-not just an extra. The Greek athletes in the old Olympic Games used it and our own Sir Edmund Hillary, who carried a little to his highest camp (28,000 feet), ate some the night before he made his final and triumphant assault on Everest. Men subjected to extreme strain and fatigue have been accustomed to use honey as a quick. restorative and stimulant. Yet we habitually buy many modern labora-tory-made products to serve the same purpose and forget, or don’t know, that nature has provided us with the perfect carbohydrate. Honey needs no refining or sterilising because bacteria cannot live in it. It has even been used as a surgical dressing in emergencies. Only this week, a listener telephoned me about this emergency use, for her husband had received a deep and jagged cut on his arm from a dirty piece of falling corrugated iron. She had read about this ancient and proven use for honey, so hastened to cover the wound with a thick layer, and the nasty cut healed cleanly and fast. Fortunately, she was one of the people who always have honey in the house. In spite of all their modern knowledge and equipment, chemists cannot make honey. It remains the "golden wonder of nature." We don’t make nearly enough use of it, but just take it for granted-like many another of God's blessings. Try eating a couple of spoonfuls when you feel really "done-up" and yet must carry on with the meal-getting for a clamouring hungry family. If the children are fretful and tired and cross, a good spoonful of honey will cheer them up and calm them down; and it won’t upset their stomachs or damage their teeth. Try it.

Honey on Porridge Just try putting a big blob of honey on your breakfast porridge, Let it melt a bit and then pour creamy milk on. Good! On Grapefruit. Cut the breakfast grapefruit in half. Separate the segments and then press honey well in with the edge of the spoon and let it stand a few minutes. Delicious! For a Tickly Cough A lemon scraped out into a dessert dish and mixed with a big spoonful of honey is simply grand for a tickling cough, and perfectly healthy, harmless and natural, A grapefruit will do as well -use the pulp as well as the juice. In Cakes Honey adds richness to the flavour of any cake or sweet, If substituting honey for sugar in a cake make allowance for

the higher moisture in honey, or you will need less liquid in your mixture. Various Honey Flavours Clover honey is generally accepted as © the best, but I read that there are some hundreds of nectar-yielding species of plants and flowers, including dandelions, ‘pussy willows, acacia, alfalfa (which gives a special tang) and wild raspberries. Heather makes a dark, yellow honey. Maltese honey, a famous trading product in the Middle Ages as well as now, owes its distinctive flavour to orange blossom. Wild raspberry honey is ruby-tinted. Honey Lemon Meringue Pie . Half a cup of honey, 1 cup water, VY cup sugar, 42 cup lemon juice, 1 teaspoon grated lemon rind, 1 tablespoon cornflour, 1 egg, 1 teaspoon butter, 1 tablespoon sugar for meringue, 1 tableenoon flour. Blend flour and cornflour to

smooth paste with water. Add honey, sugar, lemon rind and juice. Stir till boiling and simmer 2 to 3 minutes. Cool slightly and add beaten yolk and butter. When cold fill cooked pastry case. Beat egg white with extra tablespoon of sugar and pile roughly on top. Moderate oven till set and lightly brown. Honey Apple Dumplings Make a soft dough with 2 cups of flour sifted with 114 teaspoons baking powder and % teaspoon salt, % cup of shortening and mixed with milk (about Y4 cup). Roll out and cut into squares. On each place an apple, cored and the centres filled with this mixture: 6 tablespoons honey, 1 tablespoon butter, 1 tablespoon lemon juice and a pinch of salt. Moisten the edges of each square" with water and bring up the four corners to the top of the apple, pressing the edges firmly together. Place them neatly in a buttered baking dish to fit nicely and pour over them this sauce: ¥% cup honey, 3 tablespoons butter, 114 cups water, 1 teaspoon salt. Boil these together for about 5 minutes. Bake in hot oven (400 degrees or regulo 6 about 35 minutes). The honey sauce bakes into a beautiful glaze, and gives a special flavour. Serve with cream. Hot Honey Lemonade Hot honey lemonade is particularly valuable in relieving "flu." When suffering from a cold take hot honey lemonade just before retiring: 4 tablespoons lemon juice mixed with 4 tablespoons honey. Add 1 cup boiling water. Drink hot. Honey Chews Four ounces butter, 1 tablespoon honey, 3 oz. sugar, 6 oz. cornflakes.