Gloucestershire Honey

A late night making a lovely fresh batch of hot honey for the farmers market tomorrow at Berkeley Castle. It’s going to be a lovely day, come on down and start your Christmas shopping…..🙈. Did I really just say the Christmas word??

It’s really lovely here. So many lovely stalls and the atmosphere is brilliant. Well done Berkeley Castle. 👍

One more sleep….
Come and visit us at the first ever Berkeley Castle farmers market. Beautiful surroundings in the new kitchen garden, fabulous cake and coffee and lots of lovely produce to purchase.

Pollen enriched is the favourite in our house 🐝

Thank you so much to everyone who came to Dursley farmers market today and came for a chat. It was my first time of doing it on my own as usually my husband and I do it together. It was so lovely to see everyone and talk bees. The time just zoomed by. Xx

Made it home before the rain ❤️

Available to purchase in our new online store (in our contact details)
Over half sold already. This has been a great success 🌶️🔥🍯🐝

Oh my…. Let’s hope we see some sunshine. ☀️
We are in the marquee at the Cotswold Hunt Family fun day.

Sun is booked for 11 when it opens🤣

It’s here…..(We have been asked so often if we have this)

Our new HOT HONEY.

We infused our beautiful runny honey with Kashmiri chillis and I have to admit it’s mind blowingly gorgeous!

So many different ways to use it….

Pizza - It's one of the most popular foods for hot honey. The saltiness of the cheese is balanced out with the sweetness of the honey. A little spice adds to the savoriness of your slice. A little bit goes a long way.

Cheese - Much like pizza, the saltiness of the cheese balances nicely with the sweetness of the honey.

Breakfast Sandwiches - You can't go wrong hitting a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich with a little hot honey. It may even give you that extra 'kick' to wake you up in the morning.

Roasted Vegetables - Adding a little hot honey to your roasted vegetables after they are cooked can give them just to right amount of extra seasoning to make them delicious to even the most 'veggie-averse' eater.

Ice Cream - While this may not sound like a match, the contrast of heat and cold is a lot of fun. I recommend sticking to the basics... a generous scoop of fine vanilla ice cream with a thick drizzle of hot honey, to taste, of course.

BBQ - It this broad, but since there are lots of sweet sauces and rubs added to various BBQ'ed meats, hot honey can cover several bases. Make your own honey BBQ sauce with a kick, or simply drizzle some hot honey across ribs, chicken.

Cheesecake - This is another sweet dish where a little spice turns it into a totally different experience. The tangy cream cheese is an excellent mate with the spice of the honey.

Greek Yogurt - Continuing the tangy flavors, next time you want greek yogurt and honey, give hot honey a try. You can even use the yogurt as a sauce, as it's done in many middle-eastern and Mediterranean cuisines.

I’m expecting this to sell quickly. In fact my husband has already tried sneaking a few into our pantry 🤣

Waiting for the rain to stop….

And while I was suited up I had a peep inside the chimney swarm. Look how busy they’ve been.

COMING SOON…… Hot Honey🥵🔥🍕

And….. the front garden is looking like the beginning of an apiary. 😬

And just like that…. They all went back inside. What a drama!

Only one capped queen cell can be left in the splits from the swarmy hive. All others must be destroyed or used elsewhere. Multiple virgin queens make life hard.
Queen cells look like peanut shells hanging down vertically.

More night time hive manoeuvres . A swarm collected over a few days as they had taken up residence in a chimney. Now to work out where to place them. They can rest at home with me for a while. They need feeding and time to build.
I’m looking for a new site south of Berkeley, ideally with room for 8-10 hives. So please if someone knows of somewhere please let me know. I have a waiting list of places who can kindly host a few hives but I need a bit more space. 🐝

Tomorrow the sunshine is booked for ULEY DOG SHOW. Pop up, grab a beer, buy a burger and spend some quality time with your family. We will be there….come and say hi. # # #

A close up of a bee sting in my safety glove. I put them on after I was stung🤦🏻‍♀️. I usually just wear thin neoprene gloves which enable me to feel the bees. The safety gloves are thick and I feel clumsy wearing them. I then sadly hurt more bees. Always upsets me to see a sting. They’ve given their life to defend the hive.

Do you remember 3️⃣ weeks ago today a swarm moved into an old hive in my garden. I’ve left them alone as swarms are temperamental and can get flighty as they have nothing invested in their new home, no eggs, no brood, no food. And to be honest I’ve really enjoyed watching them.
Today was the day that they were sorted out. Look how much comb they’ve made in such a short space of time. There were 6️⃣ big pieces.
All comb cut and placed in frames for them to get busy in the right place. They didn’t take long to settle down.

I’ve lost count of the amount of stings I’ve had as a bee farmer. Usually because I’ve done something daft. But while it’s a regular occurrence in my life I realise that most people are scared of getting stung.
If you try not to look or smell like a flower it helps. 😉

Sting number 7 of the season!!
( totally my own fault! I was having an organic moment scooping bees up with my hands, turns out they didn’t appreciate it😳)