Manuka Honey
What is special about Manuka Honey? It comes from New Zealand. The bees eat the special manuka tree which is said to give the honey its special aroma.
Photo by Avenie in Wikipedia article on Manuka honey.
Manuka Tree With White Flowers
The manuka tree grows wild in Southern Australia and New Zealand and nowhere else. but Australia apparently produces less, most of which is snapped up by the larger the Australian Market, so you are likely to find New Zealand honey in other parts of the world.
Therefore the New Zealand manuka honey is not just the best, it is the only or majority source. But what exactly is it? What makes it so special?
Manuka is a Maori word. The manuka tree is part of a group and also known as myrtle, and is an evergreen tree which has most often white flowers, sometimes pink.
Manuka Honey Jar. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright.
I have been eating manuka honey daily. Years ago I was prescribed tablets containing vitamin D and Calcium to protect against brittle bones which end up with holes looking like sponges - osteo porosis. Osteo means bone, in Greek, as in osteopath, bone doctor, and I think of porosis as meaning pores or holes.
Apparently you need the vitamin D to help your body absorb calcium, otherwise the calcium doesn't to do you any good, I imagine just passes through. So I was prescribed the vital two-ingredient tablets. But because they were giant pills, horse pills size, too big to swallow, I never took them.
This year, 2019, when I went to my UK dentist she told me that I needed the calcium pills to protect my teeth. She said people lose teeth because of the teeth becoming loose in the disintegrating jaw.
If you take the pills, your jaws and teeth tighten up. 'After five years,' she said, 'the effect is so marked that a dentist cannot do a tooth extraction for fear of breaking the jaw, because the teeth are so tightly fixed into the solid jaw. So you have to go to hospital.'
I imagine that the good effect will also be seen in all your bones as well as your jawbone and teeth, and in your fingernails and toe nails. Well, that is after five years. But, as they say, a journey begins with a single step.I need to protect my teeth which are very prone to losing bits and losing fillings.
However, the good news is that when I went to my dentist she told me the secret of taking the pills. She said grind the pills down, that does them no harm, and take the resulting powder with honey.
Grind them with what? In theory you could bash them with an old spoon. The usual way is with a mortar and pestle. I didn't hink we had one. But we did.
Bash the big white pill into smaller pieces and powder. Add a teaspoonful of honey to mix it all together. The result is quite pleasing. A crunch honey.
I looked at my honey stock. I had a manuka honey. It is a thick honey.
Manuka honey. Picture from Wikipedia.
After a week or so of taking a spoonful every day I could see I would soon need another pot. We did a survey of manuka honey in the shops in Singapore and online to see the prices in UK supermarkets, as we have some family in each country and they can bring stuff out to Singapore on their next trip.
It turns out that the manuka honey is ridiculously expensive in Singapore. about three times the price of London, and that is not cheap.
The strange thing is, that when I first tried the manuka honey, mixed with the calcium pill straight out of the fridge, I did not think the honey had a striking flavour or aroma, not like Canadian maple syrup. However, when I opened the jar later in another room, when it had been in the heat of Singapore for half an hour, to take a photo of the jar interior, the aroma was noticeable.
However, after I asked for the cheapest thick honey, and ended up with a thin honey which looked just like sugar syrup, with no flavour, I could see the difference.
I much prefer the thick honey.
So, if it is not particularly flavoured, does it really make a difference?
The Best Pizza?
I remember when we first went to live in the USA we were told that the pizza in Rockville, Maryland was the best. We went to try it. Thick pizza. Nothing remarkable. Just a nice pizza.
However, when we went on travels around america, everywhere when we ordered a pizza, we surreptitiously said, "It's not as good as our pizza in Maryland!"
The Best Baked Beans?
It's a bit like Heinz baked beans and yogurt. You think what you are used to is nothing special, just the norm, until you try all the others.
Manuka Honey Jar Label. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
The Best Honey?
So there we have it Manuka honey, in my opinion, may or not be a not a great winner in the aroma race when seen on its own, but a winner, because in a comparison it is streets ahead of all the others.
Check Label & Symbol
Read the label on your honey. I have the one with the symbol 10, it is 10+UMF, which is the amount of the magic ingredient. (See their website.) You pay more for a more intense experience. Check the jar ingredient lists and the company supplying the honey. You get what you pay for. If you want more, you pay more.
The brand I have is Comvita. You can see from the label where they are exporting. They have offices in New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan and the UK.
Honey Comparisons
I remember in the UK in Morrisons supermarket, my son bought four different jars of honey for his wife to be. Jewish New Year was coming up and the favoured food of the weekend was apples and honey. An opportunity to test out several types of honey. We bought three cheap honey jars at under five pounds sterling, and one expensive one. I was Shocked at the price but my son said they were eating at home and it was cheaper than a meal out.
In Singapore I compared the Manuka honey with a cheap honey which looked like Golden Syrup (which is a brand name). Two of us did a comparison and the Manuka honey won, but then I prefer thick honey anyway. Do your own taste test and see which you like the most.
Useful Websites
Australian Manuka Honey
https://www.comvita.com.au/purest-source/manuka-honey/rangeAU
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C4%81nuka_honey
Singaporeair.com
About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.
See later post on Manuka honey.
Please share links to your favourite posts.
What is special about Manuka Honey? It comes from New Zealand. The bees eat the special manuka tree which is said to give the honey its special aroma.
Photo by Avenie in Wikipedia article on Manuka honey.
Manuka Tree With White Flowers
The manuka tree grows wild in Southern Australia and New Zealand and nowhere else. but Australia apparently produces less, most of which is snapped up by the larger the Australian Market, so you are likely to find New Zealand honey in other parts of the world.
Therefore the New Zealand manuka honey is not just the best, it is the only or majority source. But what exactly is it? What makes it so special?
Manuka is a Maori word. The manuka tree is part of a group and also known as myrtle, and is an evergreen tree which has most often white flowers, sometimes pink.
Manuka Honey Jar. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright.
I have been eating manuka honey daily. Years ago I was prescribed tablets containing vitamin D and Calcium to protect against brittle bones which end up with holes looking like sponges - osteo porosis. Osteo means bone, in Greek, as in osteopath, bone doctor, and I think of porosis as meaning pores or holes.
Apparently you need the vitamin D to help your body absorb calcium, otherwise the calcium doesn't to do you any good, I imagine just passes through. So I was prescribed the vital two-ingredient tablets. But because they were giant pills, horse pills size, too big to swallow, I never took them.
This year, 2019, when I went to my UK dentist she told me that I needed the calcium pills to protect my teeth. She said people lose teeth because of the teeth becoming loose in the disintegrating jaw.
If you take the pills, your jaws and teeth tighten up. 'After five years,' she said, 'the effect is so marked that a dentist cannot do a tooth extraction for fear of breaking the jaw, because the teeth are so tightly fixed into the solid jaw. So you have to go to hospital.'
I imagine that the good effect will also be seen in all your bones as well as your jawbone and teeth, and in your fingernails and toe nails. Well, that is after five years. But, as they say, a journey begins with a single step.I need to protect my teeth which are very prone to losing bits and losing fillings.
However, the good news is that when I went to my dentist she told me the secret of taking the pills. She said grind the pills down, that does them no harm, and take the resulting powder with honey.
Grind them with what? In theory you could bash them with an old spoon. The usual way is with a mortar and pestle. I didn't hink we had one. But we did.
Bash the big white pill into smaller pieces and powder. Add a teaspoonful of honey to mix it all together. The result is quite pleasing. A crunch honey.
I looked at my honey stock. I had a manuka honey. It is a thick honey.
Manuka honey. Picture from Wikipedia.
After a week or so of taking a spoonful every day I could see I would soon need another pot. We did a survey of manuka honey in the shops in Singapore and online to see the prices in UK supermarkets, as we have some family in each country and they can bring stuff out to Singapore on their next trip.
It turns out that the manuka honey is ridiculously expensive in Singapore. about three times the price of London, and that is not cheap.
The strange thing is, that when I first tried the manuka honey, mixed with the calcium pill straight out of the fridge, I did not think the honey had a striking flavour or aroma, not like Canadian maple syrup. However, when I opened the jar later in another room, when it had been in the heat of Singapore for half an hour, to take a photo of the jar interior, the aroma was noticeable.
However, after I asked for the cheapest thick honey, and ended up with a thin honey which looked just like sugar syrup, with no flavour, I could see the difference.
I much prefer the thick honey.
So, if it is not particularly flavoured, does it really make a difference?
The Best Pizza?
I remember when we first went to live in the USA we were told that the pizza in Rockville, Maryland was the best. We went to try it. Thick pizza. Nothing remarkable. Just a nice pizza.
However, when we went on travels around america, everywhere when we ordered a pizza, we surreptitiously said, "It's not as good as our pizza in Maryland!"
The Best Baked Beans?
It's a bit like Heinz baked beans and yogurt. You think what you are used to is nothing special, just the norm, until you try all the others.
Manuka Honey Jar Label. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
The Best Honey?
So there we have it Manuka honey, in my opinion, may or not be a not a great winner in the aroma race when seen on its own, but a winner, because in a comparison it is streets ahead of all the others.
Check Label & Symbol
Read the label on your honey. I have the one with the symbol 10, it is 10+UMF, which is the amount of the magic ingredient. (See their website.) You pay more for a more intense experience. Check the jar ingredient lists and the company supplying the honey. You get what you pay for. If you want more, you pay more.
The brand I have is Comvita. You can see from the label where they are exporting. They have offices in New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan and the UK.
Honey Comparisons
I remember in the UK in Morrisons supermarket, my son bought four different jars of honey for his wife to be. Jewish New Year was coming up and the favoured food of the weekend was apples and honey. An opportunity to test out several types of honey. We bought three cheap honey jars at under five pounds sterling, and one expensive one. I was Shocked at the price but my son said they were eating at home and it was cheaper than a meal out.
In Singapore I compared the Manuka honey with a cheap honey which looked like Golden Syrup (which is a brand name). Two of us did a comparison and the Manuka honey won, but then I prefer thick honey anyway. Do your own taste test and see which you like the most.
Useful Websites
Australian Manuka Honey
https://www.comvita.com.au/purest-source/manuka-honey/rangeAU
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C4%81nuka_honey
Singaporeair.com
About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.
See later post on Manuka honey.
Please share links to your favourite posts.
