How can I reuse or recycle honey?
We’ve had an email from Ronnie:
My youngest got it into his head at Rudolph likes honey (or Winnie the Pooh was pulling the sled too, we haven’t got a straight answer from him about it) and left an open jar on his window sill on Christmas eve. We only found it on Tuesday. Aside from the single fly, it looks OK but no one wants to eat it. Can we compost it?
You can compost it but if I were you, I’d save it to reuse in other ways. Honey is a great beauty aid – mix with oatmeal and water to make a soothing face mask; mix with water and a little cider vinegar for an all-over body moisturiser; with olive oil, it can make a hair condition; and it has anti-fungal qualities too so can be used as an alternative treatment for athlete’s foot.
And apparently you can use it to embalm the dead. If you’re into that sort of thing.
Any other reuses for honey?
Only one fly in it? I’m afraid I’d probably just scoop the fly out and eat the rest of the pot. If you’re fussy though…
I guess it’d be ok in anything that gets cooked thoroughly, like cakes and biscuits?
Just remove the fly, a bit of honey around it, and eat the rest of it. Honey doesn’t like bacteria or other nasty bits growing in it, so one fly does no harm to it. They found the honey which was in the pyramids left for the pharaohs afterlife in the Egypt of thousands of years ago be still edible (dry but still edible).
Or bake with it. Or make mead.
Or if you really really don’t want to eat it then use it for cosmetics. A warm honey mask feels great and nourishes the face, or you could add a bit of honey to olive oil and mix it as a luxury hair balsam (mix before use, let it stay 20 minutes or so in hair to get absorbed, rinse and done).
Honey is way too precious to compost! Use it and enjoy it.
Did you know that is takes a bee it’s whole lifetime of working really really hard to make a teaspoon of honey?
(So, it’s probably a bit too special to compost)
Anyway, it should be fine in a high temperature recipes. Use with herbs and onions, in bread (great with sunflower seeds) , drizzle over meat or quorn as a glaze, put it in cakes or biscuits.
If you don’t want to eat it use it in homemade cosmetics for its healing powers – you could probably drizzle some into a hot bath or make a face mask or lip balm.
You could rub some into very mild grazes or burns.
I shouldn’t be too worried about residue left by a dead insect. Honey is made by insects.
It’s got so much natural sugar that bacteria can’t even survive in it. Certainly makes an effective fly trap if you smear it on a piece of stiff paper.