BS: Manuka Honey

Subject: BS: Manuka Honey
From: bobad
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:21 AM

I recently purchased some manuka honey from Australia. I was attracted by the description of it as "An exotic honey with a thick consistency and rich, caramel-like flavour, collected from flowering manuka bushes." It is a very nice tasting honey.

Doing a Google search I discovered extraordinary health claims attributed to it. Having never heard of it, or of the manuka plant before I was wondering how popular it was in Australia and if it was widely used for it's purported medicinal properties.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: A Wandering Minstrel
Date: 24 May 07 - 08:14 AM

I bought some in Oz last year. It is very good for upset stomachs. It is available from health shops in the UK but at about four times the price I paid.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 24 May 07 - 08:53 AM

It is available also in Morrisons supermarkets in UK for around £6 a jar.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: bobad
Date: 24 May 07 - 12:00 PM

I paid $4.00 CDN which is the equivalent of ~£2 in the UK, for a 500 gm container. It seems that your vendors apply a healthy markup.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: mcpiper
Date: 24 May 07 - 02:32 PM

It comes, or originally came, from New Zealand. The plant is a relatively small, scrubby looking bush maybe 2 metres tall. Much sought after for firewood. The honey is as good as almost any claims made, I have seen it used as a wound dressing as it has good anti-bacterial properties and for stomach upsets. In my opinion it's best use is on toast.
We have a good selection of native honeys available to us, all with very different caracteristics and tastes. Would like to discus honey with any interested honey lovers.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 May 07 - 03:18 PM

In the Big Bend area of Texas, I bought a jar of local, wild honey, blackish-brown in color. Wonderful, but I never got back there, and I never found any advertized or for sale elsewhere.

Honey has a few more calories than sugar, but its real advantage is taste, and the variety of tastes provided by the different kinds.
Any value that honey has as a supplement is anecdotal, not supported by research.

The Manuka plant, on the other hand, parts or extracts, has been used by the Maori, and some uses have been verified, but these properties are lost to honey processed from pollen by bees.

Manuka, Leptospermum scoparium of N. Z., is a relative of the Australian Tea tree, but should not be confused with it.

Manuka has been grown in warmer parts of England and the United States as a white-flowering ornamental.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Jack Campin
Date: 24 May 07 - 04:27 PM

For medicinal purposes, there is a specific active ingredient that does the business. The honey sold in food supplement shops is labelled to say what concentration of that magic stuff is present.

BTW the correct pronunciation is MAA-noo-ka, the initial AA is much longer than the second and third syllables. Maori (or more correctly Maaori) is a quantitative language like Latin. The usual British pronunciation is ma-NOO-ka which is dead wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Bill D
Date: 24 May 07 - 04:35 PM

Manuka comes in several 'potencies'....it is cheaper without the special medicinal stuff..

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Gurney
Date: 24 May 07 - 04:53 PM

AS Q says, Manuka, or Tea-tree, or Te-tree, also yields a pungent but not unpleasant oil, which is claimed to have theraputic properties.

The first beer ever brewed in NZ, by sailors from the Captain Cook's Endeavour, was flavoured with Manuka. They had no Hops.

White or pink flowers.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: mcpiper
Date: 25 May 07 - 03:37 AM

C'mon guys, lets talk honey. I love the stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Dave'sWife
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:37 AM

I got some tasmanian leatherwood Honey from my motherinlaw back from her visit to tasmania. it tastes kind of like Vick's vapo rub. I gave it away.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Gurney
Date: 26 May 07 - 02:56 AM

Intriguing.
How do you know what Vick's tastes like? And who do you dislike so much?

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:54 PM

Gurney -

Many who were kids in the US pre-1950 or so know quite well what Vicks tastes like, as it was common to dab a little on the tongue for a sore throat. We preferred Mentholatum in our household but both were used.

Vicks has camphor as it's basic ingredient, which can "burn" sensitive skin. The menthol in Mentholatum is significantly milder.

Mentholatum has an added use as the best "remover" ubiquitously available around the household for masking tape or duct tape residue that has hardened - at least in my household. Vicks is useless for this purpose.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Bill D
Date: 26 May 07 - 05:08 PM

I LOVE Leatherwood honey! I haven't had any for several years. As soon as I can afford it, I'm going to order some via the internet.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Bill D
Date: 26 May 07 - 05:10 PM

We get some nice Mesquite honey from Trader Joes. It has a 'tang' without being overwhelming.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 26 May 07 - 06:06 PM

Kiawe produces a fine honey in Hawai'i. This small tree is abundant in drier, lowland areas, and quickly spreads into abandoned fields. It is not native (from Peru and adjacent coastal areas) but has spread widely in Hawaii (and Puerto Rico).
It is related to the mesquite of the States, and the taste is similar.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Rowan
Date: 26 May 07 - 11:10 PM

Manuka (mah nu ka, in Oz pronunciation) is the local NZ name for Leptospermum scoparium, as mentioned above. Leptospermum is in the Myrtaceae (along with eucalypts, Angophora, Darwinia etc) and L. scoparium also is found in Australia. Most Myrtaceae have considerable quantities of 'essential oils' in their tissues, especially the leaves and it is these oils that give the infusions their flavour and the bushes their extreme flammability.

Honey with large quantities of myrtaceous pollen seems to have the topical antibiotic ("topical" as in putting it on the wound rather than just swallowing it) effect irrespective of species, but seems to be stronger in honey from L scoparium, L. laevigatum (coastal teatree) and L. squarrosa (swamp paperbark); the latter two are Oz rather than NZ species.

But more research would tie the effect down to contributing causes much more specifically.

Yellow box is a very smooth flavour on the tongue and is widely sold but much of it has a lot of other sources as well. The current (Oz) drought has severly affected apiarists and honey production so conserve your stocks.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 26 May 07 - 11:47 PM

Bee colonies here in western Canada are suffering severe losses, much like those in the United States.
Cause unknown, disease or pesticides, under investigation.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 27 May 07 - 10:05 PM

G'day,

Dave's Wife: Leatherwood honey is ambrosia to my wife Patricia (but, then, she is Tasmanian). I used to find the straight Tasmanian product just a tad too pungent for my taste... but the latest offerings are milder (and don't meet Patricia's approval!

Bill D: The (probable) reason for this'dilution' of taste is that Leatherwood is being systematically exterminated by the main forestry companies in Tasmania - who clear-fell old growth native forests... and sell them as wood chips to the Japanese - them totally burn the clear-felled stands to destroy all trace of seeds and varying tree species... so they can replant with genetically identical clones of their favourite wood-chipping trees.

This is progressively wiping out the Leatherwood tree - so honey collected in the former heartland of Leatherwood Honey production (the West Coast of Tasmania) are exhibiting less and less Leatherwood tang.

Afford as much as you can afford - as soon as you can - and stockpile it! (Fortunately, honey is the only food that does not "go off"!)

Regards,

Bob

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Bill D
Date: 27 May 07 - 10:39 PM

Oh,crap! The Japanese strike again with their "use it at high rates till there IS no more" attitude! They are stripping places like Borneo of hardwoods to make chopsticks and plywood for building forms!

Ok...I'll see what I can find in Leatherwood...thanks, Bob.

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Dave'sWife
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 08:15 AM

Bob Bolton - same sort of thing is happening with Tupelo Honey. Destruction of wetlands is making that kind of honey harder and harder to come by.

Gee, maybe I should have gievn that Leatherwood honey a few more tastes before forking it over to my friend from El Salvador who said it reminded her of some honey from there.

Bill D - are you in Southern CA or are you in one of the blessed other locales that has a Trader Joe's temple of food?

Subject: RE: BS: Manuka Honey
From: Emma B
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 08:27 AM

Heather honey

yummy!