The Backyard Beekeeper's Honey Handbook: A Guide to Creating, Harvesting, and Baking with Natural Honeys

by Kim Flottum

In The Backyard Beekeeper’s Honey Handbook , seasoned expert, Kim Flottum explains the process of moving honey from beehive to honey house and how to reveal and extract it so none of the finer aromas, tastes, or colors are bruised, burned, or broken.  You’ll learn which crops produce the best tasting honey and which to avoid. It also provides instructions for careful, considerate storing, and focuses on the best ways to produce, harvest, and use the honey.

Unlike the harsh industrial methods used by beekeepers who harvest a season's blend just once a year, The Backyard Beekeeper's Honey Handbook is idea for those who want to follow a simpler path to create an unforgettable product. You'll be introduced to the amazing varieties of honey and be provided with a detailed illustrated guide to honey plants along with their bloom dates and honey flows. 

The full-color, stunning photographs illustrate and exalt the process. This book will hel you create an amazing honey crop. You'll find dozens of delicious, healthy recipes featuring artisan and varietal honey for both sweet and savory dishes. The recipes range from dips to dressings to salads and vegetables to entrees and desserts featuring your own honey.  

Genres: Nonfiction, Reference, Agriculture

168 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Gregj · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gave me a good idea in what's involved with keeping bees, and found it somewhat daunting. This last 60 or so pages included recipes for making candles, lotion, ect from beeswax and cooking with honey, which were interesting.

[Alexandria · Rating 4 out of 5]

very informative, but for the experienced bee-keeper, some knowledge/experience is needed to understand as terms are not defined. Lots of interesting recipes included.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely not a beginner level book, but definitely summarizes beginner level concepts before moving on to the "next steps" level.
Read The Backyard Beekeeper, 4th Edition if you are a beginner.
This one focuses more on preferred plants, shrubs and trees, and the production, extraction, and storage of artisan honey.
...oh and there are recipes at the end of the book.

[Vikki Callens Morrison · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book for beginner beekeepers. I will hold this book as a great resource.

[John Hobbs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent overview of honey harvesting. Really appreciated the honey plants section and the honey house tools and layout.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed Kim's look at how to keep bees and the ways to process honey. He really presented many of the different options and added his experienced opinion about them.

I felt like this was the best book to move me from novice beekeeper to a beekeeper harvesting honey from a healthy hive. Mr. Flottum has also included a range of lovely recipes, everything from sauces to desserts to creams.

[Tom M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good reference book, but I got the impression Flottum wasn't sure who his audience was here. Some of it is written for the hobbyist with a few frames, other parts are clearly written for industrial-sized honey production. As a result, some of the book will be helpful to some, but little of the writing is useful for everyone.

[Alexandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book to help you understand honey and what's important for the honey harvest. It is aimed a little more towards bigger scale bee keepers but it was not hard to adopt the advice to my small scale beekeeping. It also has some good looking recipes that I need to try yet.

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book for the novice, lots of illustrations, explanation of what alters the taste of honey and harvesting honey.
Nice reference and a good start in the process of actually procurring the honey from your new hive.

[Juliette Morris Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

While not the best written book out there, the information, photography and recipes are just lovely. As a beekeeper, this is a book I'd love to have on my reference shelves someday.

[Jaina Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent, contemporary guide that this beginner finds quite helpful.

[Sydney More · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative and well written. Some basic knowledge of beekeeping is expected by the author.

[Heydi Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic information that every beekeeper pro or not needs to read. Great recipes too.

[Guy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some helpful bits, like a listing of plants and the flavours of honey you can expect from them.