What's The Buzz

Happy New Year!  I hope that 2011 is already a promising year for all of you!  After a far too short of a vacation in Baltimore, I am back and ready to blog!

Today all of my time in the kitchen seemed to fall around bees and their byproducts.  I made lavender cupcakes with honey icing and garnished with bee pollen, I ate a honeycomb, and I also bought and ate bee pollen granules...it has been a bit of a busy night in the kitchen, but was worth it!  Enjoy!

Lavender Cupcakes with Honey Icing and Bee Pollen
Yields 18 large cupcakes

Ingredients for Cupcake Batter
8 tablespoons of butter
1 tablespoon of lavender
2 cups of flour
1/2 cup of sugar
2 teaspoons of baking soda
3 eggs
1/2 cup of milk


Ingredients for Icing
2 cups vegetable shortening
2 cups confectioners sugar
5 tablespoons honey


To Prepare the Cupcakes
1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
2. Melt 8 tablespoons of butter of a frying pan with 1 tablespoon of lavender.  Continue to cook it over low heat until it browns.

3. Strain the butter through a mesh colander to remove the lavender pods, and set aside the butter in a small bowl.  Oils bind to other oils, so the oils of the lavender (aka the flavor) will stay with the butter even though you are removing the actual flower!

4. Mix 2 cups of flour, a 1/2 cup of sugar, and 2 teaspoons of baking soda in a large bowl.
5. Mix a 1/2 cup of milk and 3 eggs into your dry ingredients.
6. Add the browned butter, and beat well!

7. Either place baking cups in your cupcake pan, or spray them well with a non-stick cooking spray.
8. Fill the cupcake cups 1/2 full with batter, and bake for approximately 10 minutes, or until they are firm and bounce back when the tops are pressed on.

9. When they are done baking, pull them out of the cups, and allow them to cool on a wire rack. 

To Prepare the Icing 
1. Place 2 cups of shortening, 2 cups of confectioners sugar, and 5 tablespoons of honey in a medium bowl.
2. Beat everything together until the batter is creamed together and has the consistency of whipped butter.

3. Ice your cupcakes, and if you would like, sprinkle with a small amount of ground bee pollen granules!

The Bee Pollen Adventure

Recently I entered a cupcake competition that had "adventure" ingredients.  Bee pollen was one of the ingredients that was on the list.  I didn't chose to use it, but was intrigued.  I never thought of bee pollen as a food ingredient, let alone as something that would be edible and on the market.  After a few minutes of research on Google, I learned that bee pollen is easily found at vitamin stores such as Vitamin Shoppe and GNC.  It comes in a few varieties such as granules, capsules, and powder.  After a little searching in my local Vitamin Shoppe, my brother and I found it in the Probiotic/Oil section in a refrigerator.  We bought a 1 pound jar for $12.49.

Impatient as always, I had my brother open it in the car while I started the drive home.  First realization: I should have bought a much smaller jar.  The granules are the size of a pin head!  At least I got my money's worth!  Second realization: They are colorful!  The granules are naturally colored and come in a variety of yellows, oranges, reds, and greens!  Third realization: The odor was...interesting.  It was sweet smelling, but reminiscent of the sweet hay smell that one might encounter on a farm.  Forth realization: The taste was sweet, but had a hay like flavor to it.

My brother, and his sciency-self, let me in on a little secret - when breaking down the granules for cooking, grind them down with a mortar and pestle, pressing between spoons, or rolling them over with a rolling pin.  When they are run through a food processor or mill they lose a great deal of their nutritional value!

Bee pollen, nutritionally, is considered a superfood.  According to the label on the bottle, the granules can be taken as 1 or more tablespoons daily, and can be consumed by either mixing them into drinks or sprinkling them on food.  It is probably important to point out that you should not use bee pollen if you are allergic or very sensitive to bee products!

I've Got a Crazy Craving...for Honeycombs!

Last fall we bought a jar of honey that came with a piece of comb inside it.  My brother and I both had heard of eating honeycombs and have been meaning to try it.  After all of the other bee and honey excitement, we decided there was no time like the present!  We each sliced a piece that was about a 1/4 inch thick and, with a little reluctance, popped them in our mouths.  DELICIOUS!!!  We chewed and chewed and chewed until we has sucked the life out of the wax.  There was a strong honey taste as well as a heavy hint of clover!  When we were done, we were able to pull a small ball of wax out of our mouths.  You can swallow the wax if you want, but we opted for not!