By: Greg Brian
Everyone knows honey is one of the sweetest natural foods in the world. The use of it to enhance food and beverages is a centuries-old practice and no doubt something you do.
Perhaps you’ve only tried honey on food, though. How does it work to sweeten your favorite beverages?
Let’s look at the most common types of drinks that become enhanced using just a few drops of raw honey.
What is the Most Common Beverage That Works Best with Honey?
It seems tea is the most common beverage benefiting from the use of honey. One reason is they both complement one another in the range of health benefits.
More people are turning to tea as a healthier alternative to soft drinks. Also, sweetening up tea with honey is very appealing and beats using packets of sugary sweeteners as many used to do.
Since tea has many healthy properties, adding a tablespoon of honey to it provides even more health benefits. Considering raw honey (unpasteurized) has dozens of antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals, you’re essentially doubling the power of the tea.
Don’t be afraid to add a drop of honey into your tea. Drinking green tea besides with honey provides a great way to get many of the nutrients you need to stay healthy.
Adding Honey to Milk
Honey milk is also a very popular drink for the obvious reasons of making it taste sweeter. Above all, though, it works similarly to tea above.
We all know milk provides Vitamin D to our diets. Yet, not everyone loves drinking a lot of milk every day. Some even despise the taste without a little bit of something added.
Rather than pour hot chocolate in there, add a tablespoon of raw honey and stir it in. If you’re an athlete, this can be a great energy booster combined with milk’s 8 grams of protein. Adding honey to other dairy products works just as well.
Yes, rather than limit honey to milk, you can also add a dash of honey to yogurt for the same healthy effect.
Adding Honey to Alcoholic Drinks
The possibilities open way up when talking about honey and libations. What alcoholic drink tastes best with honey?
Most experts contend whiskey and honey go together like a hand to glove when it comes to taste balancing. Hot Toddies are very famous and still get made, especially during the winter months.
However, many prefer gin and honey combinations as well. You’ve possibly heard of the Bee’s Knees Cocktail that mixes gin, honey, and lemon juice. This combination is classic and looks good on any table thanks to its light orange-yellow color.
Adding honey to wine is an additional practice that never ends. Some of you likely already know Honey Mead is essentially honey wine. While challenging to make (due to the required fermenting time), it’s more than well worth it.
Adding Honey to Fruit or Vegetable Juices
There’s still room to grow in the fruit and vegetable juice market creating products with honey as an ingredient. You can just buy those juices and add a dash of honey yourself.
Adding honey to these only compounds the amount of antioxidants you can get in a day. Did you know raw honey has up to 150 phenolic compounds in it, according to science?
That’s a lot, though juices with real fruits and vegetables in them can give you even more when adding in the honey.
Experiment with your favorite beverages to see what tastes the best. If you buy raw honey in bulk from us at Artie’s Harvest, you’ll have enough to use for a lifetime.
References:
https://honey.com/food-processors/beverages/beverage-trends
