Cooking With Honey

Honey can be substituted for sugar in most recipes, and if not completely at least partially. Cooking with honey can make food taste better and be healthier. In addition baked goods made with honey will stay moister much longer than goods baked with sugar.

Substituting for Sugar

Replace a cup of sugar in most any recipe, with 3/4 cup of honey (since honey is sweeter than sugar), and then since honey contains about 17% water, we need to reduce the liquid in the recipe by 1.6 oz. or 3 1/3 teaspoons. Finally we have to adjust the acidity, since honey is more acidic than sugar, so to neutralize the acidity add 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda for each cup of sugar replaced. This final step may require some experimenting: if the botom of the crust turns out too dark with an alkaline taste (opposite of acidic) reduce the amount of soda added.

To recap, for each cup of sugar replaced:

• Substitute 3/4 cup of honey
• Reduce liquid by 3 1/3 teaspoons or 1.6 oz.
• Add 1/4 tsp. of Baking Soda

Granulation of Honey

Honey has a natural tendency to granulate over time. When this occurs returning it to a liquid state requires only warming of the honey. Take care that the temperature does not exceed 160 degrees Farenheit.

Storage of Honey

Honey can store for a very long time. 3,000 year old honey was found in the pyramids of Egypt and it was still delicious. Bees are the only creature that manufacture food for humans, and they do such a clever job that it preserves extremely well. Part of the trick is the reduction of water content to about 17%. By drying out the nectar to this degree the bees prevent fermentation. That's why it is best to avoid contaminating your honey with water, if you get water in it, it will increase the chance of fermentation. Honey is best stored in a warm area of the house. It is less likely to ferment or granulate at 80°, and will not ferment at temperatures below 50° but at the lower temperatures granulation is more likely.