honey

[adrian_turtle]

In my extreme youth, my father's uncle kept bees. Going
out to see the beehives, and poke at the draining sections
of honeycomb, were a minor sort of adventure for me and
my cousins. I liked that aspect of it very much. But I
wished it weren't necessary for the whole extended family
to use that honey for the holidays.

Uncle Abe's bees made buckwheat honey. Extremely dark,
it smelled like hot iron and tasted like sulfured molasses.
(I loathe molasses. I won't even eat Jif peanut butter,
because the molasses in it bothers me.) When I was a
child at the High Holidays, and my parents and grandparents
were wishing everyone a good year, a sweet year, I remember
dipping the tiniest possible corners of bread or apple
slices into that buckwheat honey.

Shopping before Rosh Hashanah this year, I found myself
scanning the shelves of a rather boring local supermarket,
looking for buckwheat honey. I probably wouldn't have
bought it, even if they had it, but I was oddly disappointed
not to have the option. (They didn't even have orange
blossom or tupelo! I've gotten spoiled.) The clover
honey made a perfectly good honeycake, and we managed
not to get it in anyone's hair yesterday. NB: put the
bread and honey down before the group hug with long-
haired women.

Last year, we introduced the local toddler to the custom,
using orange blossom honey. She was thrilled, both because
she loved dipping anything into anything else, and because
she wasn't usually allowed anywhere NEAR a bowl of honey.
"Just like Pooh bear," she crowed, as she immersed her apple
slice and part of her hand.