Rain, Rain Go Away!

This relentless rain does not bode well for the 2011 spring honey crop. Foragers don't fly when it's raining and the wet weather can wash out the nectar in many spring blooms. There's a small stand of black locust trees near our apiary. When the creek don't rise--as it is surely doing now--showy black locust tree blooms (pictured on the left) produce copious amounts of nectar that bees love and turn into a delicate, delightful and delicious spring honey. My hopes for a strong spring honey crop wane with every rainy day. (Photo by Jennifer Anderson at the USDA-NRCS PLANTS database.)

What else to do on a rainy Sunday, but make pancakes for lunch or dinner?

Adirondack Honey Pancakes

These light and fluffy pancakes are simple to make. Serve with more honey!

2 eggs, separated

1 tablespoon honey (I use our amber, summer honey)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk (skim or 2% is fine)

1 tablespoon butter, melted

1 cup all-purpose unbleached flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

More honey for serving

Beat the egg whites until they hold a firm peak and set aside. In another bowl, combine the egg yolks and honey, mixing well, then gradually add the milk while stirring constantly. Add the melted butter to the milk mixture and stir well. Sift the flour and baking powder onto some wax or parchment paper. Whisk the flour into the milk mixture, stirring to be sure the batter is uniformly moist. There will be some lumps. Scoop about 1/3 of the beaten egg whites into the batter and fold in to lighten the batter. Add the rest of the egg whites to the batter, gently folding until no streaks of egg white remain. Heat a griddle or large frying pan and lightly coat with cooking spray. When a drop of water sizzles on the surface, spoon batter into pan making three 3-inch pancakes (or any size you want, really). Let rise and brown on one side--about three minutes. Flip and brown the other side. Serve immediately with more honey to drizzle on top. Makes about nine 3-inch pancakes.

A Bevy of Honey Salad Dressings

It's been great weather for salad greens this year, though this batch of lettuce we planted in our cold frame has been bitter from the start.  Nothing like a nice honey-based salad dressing to offset any bitter green! Read on for a selection of dressings for any of the greens you may be enjoying before the weather really heats up.

Poppy-Seed Dressing
1/2 cup summer honey
1 tsp. dried mustard
1 tsp. salt
1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon finely grated sweet onion
1 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 tablespoons poppy seeds
In a small food processor, add the honey, mustard, salt, vinegar and onion.  Process until well-blended.  While the processor is going, slowly pour in oil until the dressing is well emulsified. Pour into a bottle or jar and add poppy seeds. Makes about 1 1/2 cups dressing.  Store in refrigerator--keeps for about 2 or 3 weeks.

Mary Helen's 3-3-3 Salad Dressing
One of our regular customers at the St. James Farmers' Market in Sewickley shared this simple, versatile and delicious dressing recipe with us last year.
For one cup of dressing:
1/3 cup honey (summer honey is best)
1/3 cup vinegar (we've used cider vinegar, red wine vinegar and home-made raspberry vinegar all with good results)
1/3 cup oil (we've used extra virgin olive oil and canola oil)

Combine well, taste and add salt and pepper. To this basic dressing, you can add chopped garlic or minced onion, herbs such as parsley, dill or thyme, a little Dijon mustard--let your imagination be your guide.

Honey Mustard Dressing
This recipe comes from Kim Flottum's Honey Handbook (reviewed in Review of Honey Cookbooks, Part I).  He claims it's a salad dressing "to die for" and we tend to agree!
1 3/4 cups mayonaise
1/2 cup summer honey
1 tablespoon white vinegar
2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon minced onion
2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
Combine all of the ingredients in a bowl and mix well.  Makes about 2 cups.

BONUS!  
Chopped Salad Recipe with Honey & Garlic Dressing
The ingredients in this chopped salad can be adapted to include whatever produce happens to be in season.  All vegetables and fruits should be chopped in about a 1/2 inch dice.

1 tart apple, cored but not peeled.
1 tablespoon raw cider vinegar
1/2 small head red cabbage
1-2 carrots
6-8 medium-sized romaine lettuce leaves, torn into bite-sized pieces
1/4 cup dried cranberries

Anxiously waiting for our 2011 garlic!

1/4 pecans, toasted
Honey & Garlic Dressing:
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons honey
1 small garlic clove, finely diced
salt and pepper to taste
Combine the dressing ingredients in a food processor or jar and blend well.  Placed the diced apple in a salad bowl and toss with 1 tablespoon cider vinegar.  Add each veggie to the bowl as you dice it, waiting to add the lettuce, cranberries and pecans until you're ready to serve.  When ready to serve, add the lettuce, cranberries and pecans and drizzle on half of the dressing, tossing well.  Taste and add more dressing if needed.  Remaining dressing can be stored in the fridge for a week.  Makes 4 servings and is easily doubled.

Why and How Do Bees Swarm?

Swarming is the way that honeybees reproduce their colonies. It is, as Robert often says, a "blessed event" for them--like a birth. When they sense that their colony is strong enough to divide, they stop feeding the queen so that she will be light enough to fly. The old queen takes off with about one-third to one-half of the worker bees, leaving behind several developing queens in swarm cells.

A number of factors can trigger honeybees to begin making swarm preparations. One of the most common is congestion in the hive. If they sense that they're running out of room for the queen to lay eggs, they'll prepare to swarm.

Though a blessed event for honeybees, for beekeepers, a swarm means losing up to half the bees in a colony and so beekeepers try their best to manage swarms using a number of techniques. One way they try to prevent swarming is to be sure the colony has plenty of space. They will intersperse empty frames and add more supers (boxes) to the colony to add more room for the colony to grow. They will also make "artificial swarms" or "splits" to give the bees the impression that they have already swarmed. Here's a great YouTube video of how to make a split:

For more information about swarms, check out this link from the University of Nebraska's Department of Entomology.

Swarm Season!

May is the start of swarm season in Western Pennsylvania and Saturday was a busy day for swarms. Steve Repasky, in the photo above, captured this large swarm from a small tree in Wilkinsburg.

Swarms are dramatic to witness, yet don't deserve the fear they often evoke. Swarming bees rarely sting for a few reasons. One is that, before leaving the original hive, the worker bees engorge themselves with nectar so that they will have something to eat in their new home. Often, they're so full of nectar that they can't extend their stingers. Another reason they're unlikely to sting is that they do not (yet) have a hive to defend.

Local beekeeping organizations like the Beaver Valley Area Beekeepers' Association and Burgh Bees keep "swarm lists" of beekeepers who, like Steve, will try to recapture a swarm. In a future post, we'll write about why bees swarm in the first place.

Jay Ressler's Gorgeous Photography!

Local photographer, Jay Ressler stopped by the Gallery on 43rd Street yesterday for Lawrenceville's Blossom Tour and took some fantastic digital photographs of the busy bees in our observation hive. He has a wonderful close-up of the turquoise-marked queen. She has an injured back leg and hobbles a bit--an injury that would likely mean she is not long for this world. We've put her into service as a "show queen"--a job she performs very well!

Check out all of Jay's photographs at jayressler.com and at his blog jayressler.com/blog. Thanks for showcasing honeybees, Jay!

See You at the Gallery on 43rd Street in Lawrenceville on Saturday!

Join us on Saturday from 11 to 1 at Gallery on 43rd Street for Lawrenceville's annual Blossom Tour.  We'll be joined by legendary beekeeper Jim Fitzroy and his wife, Eileen.  Jim was instrumental in extracting a feral honeybee colony from a building in Braddock in 2009.  Check out this Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article: Braddock Abuzz.  Jim's the guy on the scaffold in the photo working with bees without a veil.   Robert's standing next to him fully suited.

We'll have an observation hive and honey to taste--bring your mom!

Asparagus with Honey Garlic Sauce

If you can bear to add anything besides a bit of salt to the wonderful bumper crop of asparagus we're having this year, this recipe from the National Honey Board is worth a try.  It's sure to impress Mom, too!

1 lb fresh asparagus
1/2 cup Dijon mustard
1/2 cup dark ale or beer
1/3 cup honey
1 clove garlic, minced
1 teaspoon fresh thyme, minced
1/2 teaspoon salt
Wash and trim woody ends from asparagus (or use a vegetable peeler to peel them if you want to savor every last bite).  Add asparagus to boiling salted water and cook, covered, about 2 minutes until just barely tender. Combine mustard, beer, honey garlic & thyme.  Taste and add salt if needed.  Drizzle on cooked asparagus. Serves 4.