Favorite type of honey

To simply promote chatter in the mead making thread i am curious as to what everyone's go to type of honey is for mead. I will be making my first batch of mead in the next couple of weeks and i think that i will be going with the orange blossom honey, later on possibly going 4 parts orange blossom 1 part clover and mixing it up a little bit. The yeast i will be using is Red Star Montrachet. Mainly because this yeast has a lower alcohol tolerance as i don't necessarily want a real dry mead (going for the sweeter end.)

The hardest part in my process right now is finding a honey supplier at a decent price. Here in central Kansas they must have had a poor harvest which has driven prices WAY up! I was quoted for 2 gallons (24 LBS), around $200 which i thought was absolutely outrageous. I'd rather pay the shipping from purchasing online than to pay that absurd amount.

When i get started on my process i will post the journal and pictures for others to view. Wish me luck!

Looking forward to hearing from you guys

My current batch of mead is nade with honey that came from a citrus (oranges) farm, so hope that will play a role in taste. Have you tries local beekeepers? Or beekeepingclubs? It is the cheapest way of getting honey for us in South Africa, store bought just isn't economic.

RevA said:

My current batch of mead is nade with honey that came from a citrus (oranges) farm, so hope that will play a role in taste. Have you tries local beekeepers? Or beekeepingclubs? It is the cheapest way of getting honey for us in South Africa, store bought just isn't economic.

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Yes i have tried the local beekeepers. Here where i live in Kansas the honey harvest must have been extremely poor. That is why the local prices are so high. I would't use store bought honey ever only raw unpasteurized honey.

Wow it must have been a horrible honey harvest. Good luck getting reasonably priced. Orange blossom works well, but white blossom works just as well.

On the other side the darker honeys like Tulip Poplar also make great meads. This year was wet and cool spring in a lot of places and slowed down the bees building up for the flow which of course means less bees and less honey. I have a bucket of dark dark honey in my basement, going to be my whole seasons supply, going to put some in a Black Raspberry melomel, agonizing over what to make the rest into, maybe a nice traditional and save some to backsweeten with. Montrachet can be a smelly yeast if you dont feed it right, lots of other choices out there that I think are better, many threads on the "best" yeast for meads and Montrachet is not mentioned very often (except by newbies) WVMJ

This year I bought honey from a few different local beekeepers. Got 10Lbs of sunflower, 10Lbs each of two different multi florals (one early season, one late season). I paid $30/4L ice cream pail. I like the sunflower's nuttiness for heavier meads with more interesting flavours and depth, the early multi floral is nice with flower and tea meads, and the late season is great for melomels.

I'm looking at a boutique apiary for some specialty honey this year. They go into different neighbourhoods in the city and so have extremely localized honeys. "Fort Rouge", "Wolsley", etc. It's pretty awesome, but more pricey at around $45/4L pail (10Lbs).

the_rayway said:

This year I bought honey from a few different local beekeepers. Got 10Lbs of sunflower, 10Lbs each of two different multi florals (one early season, one late season). I paid $30/4L ice cream pail. I like the sunflower's nuttiness for heavier meads with more interesting flavours and depth, the early multi floral is nice with flower and tea meads, and the late season is great for melomels.

I'm looking at a boutique apiary for some specialty honey this year. They go into different neighbourhoods in the city and so have extremely localized honeys. "Fort Rouge", "Wolsley", etc. It's pretty awesome, but more pricey at around $45/4L pail (10Lbs).

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Even your "specialized" honey seems to be cheaper than the normal even wildflower honey that i am finding around here, they're wanting $5 a pound for the honey around here. I like to help the locals but i can only do so much. I'll keep searching and hopefully find some soon.

Most beekeepers will harvest once or twice a year, but they generally sell out before Christmas. The price may come down in a month or two when theres more of the fall honey harvest on the market, but generally speaking, beekeepers can ask $20/quart (3lbs) and sell out before the holidays.

If you're getting quoted $15/quart, I'd be jumping all over that.
Real honey costs real money. Adulterated corn syrup from China, slightly less, and sugar will always be cheaper.. But real, local, quality honey, will never be cheap. You get what you pay for.

My favorite honey is the PNW Blackberry Honey, but I'm kind of spoiled in that way.

Deezil said:

Most beekeepers will harvest once or twice a year, but they generally sell out before Christmas. The price may come down in a month or two when theres more of the fall honey harvest on the market, but generally speaking, beekeepers can ask $20/quart (3lbs) and sell out before the holidays.

If you're getting quoted $15/quart, I'd be jumping all over that.
Real honey costs real money. Adulterated corn syrup from China, slightly less, and sugar will always be cheaper.. But real, local, quality honey, will never be cheap. You get what you pay for.

My favorite honey is the PNW Blackberry Honey, but I'm kind of spoiled in that way.

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5 dollars a pound just seems outrageous to me. Is that really what the price is all around at this point in time? I was hoping for $3.5 per pound. Is that just a pipe dream?

You just get what you pay for.

3.50/lb is what I can get from the grocery store near me. I think its $3.54 for clover.
But its been processed, who knows in what fashion - heat processing will alter the flavor.
And who knows if its really pure.
And it's clover - the only thing more generic is 'wildflower' honey lol.

The $5/lb stuff from a local beekeeper is usually just strained. It still contains all the more delicate flavors and aromas.

When it comes to a really light flavored honey like Blackberry, any amount of heat treating is a game changer for the final product - both honey & mead.
I bought 5 gallons / 60lbs, to get quality honey in the 4-dollar range, and bought it from the one of the largest local honey distributors.

It'll come down more if you buy 55 gallon barrels at a time.. But that's a lot bigger than most on this forum will ever take meadmaking.

Deezil said:

You just get what you pay for.

3.50/lb is what I can get from the grocery store near me. I think its $3.54 for clover.
But its been processed, who knows in what fashion - heat processing will alter the flavor.
And who knows if its really pure.
And it's clover - the only thing more generic is 'wildflower' honey lol.

The $5/lb stuff from a local beekeeper is usually just strained. It still contains all the more delicate flavors and aromas.

When it comes to a really light flavored honey like Blackberry, any amount of heat treating is a game changer for the final product - both honey & mead.
I bought 5 gallons / 60lbs, to get quality honey in the 4-dollar range, and bought it from the one of the largest local honey distributors.

It'll come down more if you buy 55 gallon barrels at a time.. But that's a lot bigger than most on this forum will ever take meadmaking.

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Thank you for the "food for thought". I wouldn't ever consider purchasing from the grocery store, i'm looking for a quality product and I don't think processed grocery store honey will give me the quality of product that i'm looking for. I think i'll just fork out the higher prices for quality raw honey. I was just looking for another mead makers opinion on the prices before i purchased some and in turn got burned.

Thanks for the insight!

In terms of pricing, at least in Canada, the beekeeping association sets the recommended prices. If I want to save a bit more, sometimes I ask for any honey from the previous year (it never goes bad!). And our store honey is usually canola because the processing plant here knows how to keep it from crystallizing.

I also put together an order with a bunch of people or my regular lady so I get the best prices. When asking around I'm always surprised how many people want raw honey.

Good luck with your search

I found some orange blossom honey for a total of $4.19 per pound with shipping included in that price. I am pleased with that price and am like a kid in a candy store waiting for my honey to arrive so I can start my batch of mead. If all goes as planned I will be starting on Friday.

I was quoted 10 dollars a pound at a craft show recently.
wow !!!

Bill

wpt-me said:

I was quoted 10 dollars a pound at a craft show recently.
wow !!!

Bill

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Wow that's highway robbery! Best of luck on your honey search as well.