Beth's Bees Recipes with Honey

I get asked all the time about how to adjust recipes to use honey. Here’s my answer. Don’t! Just substitute honey for sugar straight up. If you think about it, most “tried and true” recipes were probably converted from honey to sugar at one point in their history. So—convert them back. OK, OK—it’s a liquid where there used to be a dry ingredient. True, and I get that. But the first time I make a recipe, I will do a straight substitution and edit as I see fit going forward. Sometimes, I want my muffins to be a little more “domed shape” so I’ll add maybe an extra 1/4 c. of flour to the recipe. Sometimes, I don’t need to do a thing. It will still taste great and be much healthier for you. Honey is a natural humectant which means it draws moisture from the air. This means that your baked goods will stay more moist—longer—a great feature in arid climates. And let’s chat about organic ingredients while we’re at it. Bees are in trouble for a lot of different reasons. I like to call them the 5 P’s: poor forage (lack of flowers), pesticides, pests, pathogens and politics. Organic ingredients address the 2nd p—pesticides. If you want to help bees, you need to quit supporting the agricultural system that is poisoning them. So—buy organic—all the time!