Exploring the World of Honey with C. Marina Marchese

In this episode of Yard to Table , Trevor and Ellen Crafts sit down with C. Marina Marchese—a beekeeper, author, and honey sommelier whose journey from artist to honey connoisseur is as inspiring as it is sweet. Marina shares how a single taste of fresh honey from a neighbor’s hive transformed her life, leading her to create Red Bee Honey and found the American Honey Tasting Society (AHTS).

Dive into the fascinating world of honey as Marina teaches Trevor and Ellen the sensory analysis techniques she mastered in Italy. Together, they taste honeys from around the globe, exploring their diverse flavors and stories. Marina also introduces her latest book, The World Atlas of Honey, which profiles over 80 countries and their unique botanical honey sources.

Get ready to savor the art and science behind one of nature’s sweetest creations. Don’t forget to pick up her book and follow Marina and Red Bee Honey on Instagram for more honey-filled adventures!

And to see what's happening with Ellen and Trevor at Stonebrook House follow @stonebrookhouse on Instagram today!

Questions? Ideas? Things you need to say? Message us!

Follow Yard to Table on Instagram at @yard_to_table_podcast 🌱🍽️ and see what’s happening with Ellen and Trevor by following @stonebrookhouse. And don't forget to follow, like and leave a review wherever you listen to the show! TY 💙

Episode Transcript

Trevor (00:00):
Music.

(00:14):
Well, hello Ellen.

Ellen (00:15):
Well, hello Trevor.

Trevor (00:17):
This is another amazing day here at Stonebrook. It's
another amazing day here on yardto table.

Ellen (00:24):
Very excited. It's a very sweet day on yard to table.

Trevor (00:28):
Sweet day. Yes, I think that that's called
foreshadowing. You know, that'sthe official term for
foreshadowing. I like to givelittle hints. You do. You're a
hinter. You're a hint giver.
You're in the hinterland. Theyget, maybe the readers

Ellen (00:42):
buzzing, the readers. No wait, I like to give little
hints that give the listenersthe listen.

Trevor (00:48):
There you go. Listeners, because they're listeners. If
they're reading the podcast,then that'll be unique. I like
to do it again. No, I like it.
This is perfect. I'm not I'm notallowing you to get out of that
at all. There's no doing itagain, because that was awesome

Ellen (01:02):
I like to get the listeners buzzing. There you go.
Oh, buzzing.

Trevor (01:06):
You like to get the listeners buzzing. There's
another one, another little hit.

Ellen (01:10):
Well, I will say, overall, it has been a really
fun journey. This is our sixth,seventh episode,

Trevor (01:16):
9th, 10th. We're not sure. I'm not sure.

Ellen (01:20):
Well, Trevor, who do we have today?

Trevor (01:22):
Today, today, on the sweet, buzzing podcast, yard to
table through all of your hints.
Well, today, our guest is anauthor, a neighbor here in
Weston. Actually, this communityis just incredible and a
beekeeper. She is the founder ofthe A, H, T, S, which, of
course, is the American honeytasting society. And she's a

(01:46):
member and an instructor for theItalian national register of
experts in the sensory analysisof honey.

Ellen (01:55):
I am so into this,

Trevor (01:59):
I normally don't pause in an intro, but at the same
time, that is a very impressivesociety to be a part of. I can't
wait to learn more. I can't I'mvery excited. And she received
there at that National Registerof honey experts in the sensory
analysis of honey in Italia,formal training as a honey

(02:21):
sensory expert now that, if thatwasn't enough, because that's
already fantastic. She's thefounder of Red Bee honey. She's
been on numerous TV shows,everything from on the road with
edible nutmeg Weekends atYankee, Vice TV, Dr Oz, even
ABC's The Chew... We arethrilled to have here at the
table with us, the one and onlyMarina Marchese, welcome.

Marina (02:45):
Thank you for having me.
I'm very excited to be here.

Trevor (02:48):
We are enormously excited to have you here.

Ellen (02:49):
I'm thrilled. There's so much in the intro that I want to
talk about. I just, I'm buzzing.
I said it again,

Trevor (03:00):
Our neighbor in Weston.
Is that what you wanted to talkabout?

Ellen (03:02):
I did well, that was the first thing I wanted to say,
because we always like toconnect how we heard about our
guests. And I we first heardabout Red Bee honey. And it was
because we got a lovely honeysampling kit from my, from my
from your dad, from my father inlaw, and it came with this
beautiful wheel and a tastingwheel, and I had never seen

(03:22):
anything like that before. Thehoney was delicious. And we got
a book, and we got a book,

Trevor (03:28):
and the book was your book, and it was phenomenal.
That's

Marina (03:31):
awesome. Thank you.
You're very glad you enjoyed it.

Ellen (03:34):
It was it was great. And of course, then we found out you
were from Weston, and that justvalidated our move, because
we're like, there's so manyamazing, creative people here,
and I'm but I'm afraid, Marina,I'm embarrassed to admit to you
that growing up, I was not a fanof honey.

Trevor (03:50):
You're going in there already. Well, I figure I just
want to be like, let's put allthe cards on the table right out
of the gate. Yes, yes.

Ellen (03:59):
I will say that my experience with honey was mostly
the plastic jar that had thebeat of the bear shape, that
bear shaped honey container. Iwas not a big fan. And then I
tried local honey, and that wasa completely different

(04:19):
experience. And I understandthat your first taste of honey
was kind of life changing muchmore than mine. Can you tell us
a little bit about

Marina (04:25):
that? Yeah, it's life changing. And yes, we all did
grow up with the little plasticHoney Bear, right? I can see him
in my head Exactly. And it wasin the back end of the cupboard,
right? And then it wascrystallized and hard and
chunky. Couldn't get it out soyou threw it away and started
with the white sugar, right? Thepowdered sugar, whatever. So for

(04:48):
me personally, I came from thearts, and I lived in the city
for a long time. I went to theSchool of Visual Arts, and I had
a pretty good career as anillustrator. Things changed and
I came back to connect. Kit, andI connected with the art
community here. And through theart community, I met a neighbor
who was a beekeeper, and thiswas back in 2000 so you didn't

(05:10):
meet too many beekeepers backthen. It was a, you know, I like
to remind people, it was beforewe were talking about organic we
were talking about farmersmarkets. So to meet a beekeeper
was a little bit off bee, andthey invited me over to visit
their bees. And this happened inWeston, so I went over on a

(05:31):
beautiful Saturday afternoon andshowed up and I was given the
bee hat the veil. And how'd youfeel about that? Well, Holland
blackiston is one of my coauthors, who was the person that
my neighbor, and he said to me,wahne, bees are very curious
creatures. They like to crawlinto the nooks and crannies of

(05:54):
our clothing, and these aregoing to stop the bees from
stinging our faces. Thank you.
Yeah. So, you know, I was reallyexcited, but yet it was a little
bit trumpet, you know, yeah. Sohe smoked the hive, he opened up
the bees, and the first thingthat struck me was the bees were
just ignoring us, like 1000s ofbees just crawling on the top of

(06:16):
the hive. And I said to him, sowhy are they not attacking?
Because bees attack, right?
You're supposed to run and swatand everything. We've been
taught that they swarm.

Trevor (06:28):
I've seen that episode of Winnie the Pooh where he goes
and yeah, as a favorite,

Ellen (06:33):
yeah. So he don't get me singing. I'm a little black,
rain cloud.

Marina (06:38):
So he said to me, honeybees are not native to the
US, and my bees are Italianbees. And I said, Italian bees,
pedigree bees. And he said,Well, you know, most of the bee
species here in the US areItalian bread, but there's many
different kinds of species. Andthat visit ended up with me

(07:00):
getting to taste the fresh honeyout of the hive, and it was like
nothing I had tasted like. Mytaste buds exploded. It was
sublime, full of flavor like notthe little plastic bear from the
store. So I ended up getting onehive,

Ellen (07:16):
I figured, well, so you had that taste, and you're like,
I need a hive.

Marina (07:20):
I need to have honey every day. I need to have my own
honey. But meanwhile, you know,there's a little bit of work
that's involved and learning,and I was all in for it. And I
figured, you know, it'll be alittle hobby I'll do on the
weekend. Well, you talk to anybeekeeper and it takes over your
life, right? So you start onehigh becomes two, becomes three,

(07:43):
becomes 10, and then you'rebuying all equipment. You're the
next thing you know, you're atthe bee club, you're on the
board, you're going toconferences, you're trading
honey with people like andyou're like, I gotta start
making some money. I gotta startrecouping some of this money. So
red bee honey was born as a wayto sell my honey and to sort of

(08:05):
make this business sustainable.
So that's really the beginning.

Ellen (08:11):
So really changed your life. You went from a taste to a
business woman

Marina (08:17):
to a honey entrepreneur.

Ellen (08:19):
I love that, and

Trevor (08:20):
I know that you were on the chew and Clinton Kelly said
about you when you appeared onthe show, that you turned your
backyard beekeeping into abuzzing business, which we're
gonna say buzzing a lot our way,good alliteration. But
alliterations aside, we'vestarted a lot of businesses, and
we're creative producers, and soI love the sort of genesis of,

(08:42):
how did you get red be up on itsfeet? Because it's a big leap to
go from just a single hobbybusiness all the way to full
production and a brand and abrand tell us, just give me a
little of how that all cooked.

Marina (08:59):
Yeah, that's a great question. So I discovered
something about myself, youknow, having a creative
background, being an artist anda designer. I was also doing
product development. A lot of myart and design was on product.
So I had a good understanding. Iworked in China for a few years
with various companies inmanufacturing. So I had this

(09:22):
background, and the real ahamoment for me was when it came
time to design the logo and thebranding. I didn't know I can do
that. So, you know, and the logoand the design has evolved over
time, changed a little bit, butthat's when the art and the bees
met, and it was really, truly,you know, an experience that

(09:46):
they came together for me. And Iwas always wondering how I'm
gonna just leave my art careerbehind. But no, it they met in
that way. So I was able tocreate the brand over time and
learn, you know. How to, youknow, design and develop
everything. The products

Ellen (10:04):
I love that art and the brand and the bees met. I love
that.

Trevor (10:09):
Our daughter painted a picture of a bee she did a
couple of about five months ago.
Yeah, work well together. I cantell you that

Marina (10:16):
Was it a Red Bee?

Trevor (10:20):
It was not a Red Bee. So that means that you have a
pretty decent scale in yourapiary here, right? Like in town

Ellen (10:29):
and Trevor for our listeners, what is an apiary?

Trevor (10:31):
That's where the bees live. That's a that's a somebody
who has a lot of bees. That'sright, yeah,

Marina (10:36):
it's a group of beehives. Those wooden boxes
that kind of look like filecabinets. Those are beehives. So
a group of beehives is anapiary. How many do you have? So
right now I have six, which is alot for me. We, at one point,
had about 15. That was insane.
But you know, now, four bookslater and teaching and

(10:58):
traveling, I don't really havethe time to manage so many bees,
but I have to have bees, and Ihave to have that grounding
experience and a connection

Ellen (11:12):
I would imagine, right?
That's what inspired you. That'sthe continuous inspiration we
get that a lot.

Trevor (11:18):
If our listeners out there who love local things,
they also love experiencingthings in their own backyard. If
they wanted to become abeekeeper, oh, I don't know, say
like if Trevor, maybe somebodyon the other side of the
microphone here who's sitting inthis chair, not naming any
names, also wanted to get bees.
What would

Ellen (11:38):
is this going to become the chicken conversation? You
know what?

Trevor (11:43):
Let's just, let me ask the questions that are because
everybody has to know. What doesit take to become a beekeeper if
they're inspired to get bees andsomebody wants to start the
process and to do it correctly?
Yeah?

Marina (12:00):
Yeah, that's what I always say, to do it right,
takes to it right. So for me,personally, I had a mentor, so I
was introduced to bees, and Ihad somebody to call on those
days that I opened up the hiveand did an inspection, and
thought, Oh, my God, my bees areall dying. What's going on? You
know? Because it takes time tolearn the behavior and what's

(12:22):
going on and what to look for.
And I highly recommend joining aB club. And there's B clubs in
every city, every state, everycountry. There's groups of
people that join together foreducational purposes, and we
happen to have one that meetsright here in Weston, the
backyard, beekeeper,

Trevor (12:43):
I'm ready Sign me up.
Coach. I am ready

Marina (12:45):
Thursday night, Tuesday night. Tuesday we have a
meeting. All right,

Ellen (12:50):
so that makes sense. So getting a good mentor, really
understanding what you need toget into it. Because, you know,
I know this isn't a true crimepodcast, but I've heard
something called counterfeithoney. I know I'm getting down
the you do like a true crime. Ido love it. So what is
counterfeit honey? Is that athing?

Marina (13:12):
Counterfeit honey is honey that's been adulterated.
Okay? And

Trevor (13:17):
sound good. So it sounds like a crime. Yeah, it's a
crime.
It's a crime against honey innature. So

Marina (13:22):
So there's a couple different ways that honey can be
counterfeited. But what's reallyfascinating is honey is the
third most food suspect toadulteration, after milk and
olive oil. Yes, oh yeah. There'sa lot of honey fraud out there,
so there's a couple differentthings that can happen.

(13:46):
Basically, when you have honey,it's a raw product. It's
produced by bees. But if thingsare added, because a bee only
makes a 12th of a teaspoon ofhoney in their entire life,
honey is rare and precious. Andall the beekeepers here in the
US, we do not make enough honeyto meet the demand. And

(14:10):
everybody wants local honey.
It's not enough honey foreverybody to have local honey.
It's very, very scarce. So forthis reason, we have a lot of
imported honey into the US. Andif you read the labels, you'll
see that it's not only justimported from a country, it's
blended from like, threedifferent countries. Like, why?
Oh, interesting.

Trevor (14:32):
So, like, you'll see, like you said about olive oil,
you'll have a blend ofArgentinian and Italian and
California. And all these thingscome together exactly,

Marina (14:41):
exactly. So there's a couple different things, you
know, mislabeling the country oforigin, saying it's local us
made when it's not adding othersugars to, you know, expand your
offerings. So adding, you know,different kinds of syrups, high
fructose corn syrup, all ofthose. Things, believe it or

(15:01):
not, you can do that if youdeclare it on the label. So if
you want to say honey and sugar,that's okay, but when they don't
declare that on the label,that's fraud. That's, you know,
food fraud.

Ellen (15:16):
Wow. And so that's really because they're trying to
extend this very preciousresource, because they're just
it's not meeting demand

Marina (15:24):
exactly, and it happens with things like manuka honey,
which everybody wants. Orthere's other honeys that we
produce here in the US that arereally like national treasures,
like sour wood honey, tupelohoney, you know, black locusts,
acacia honey. These are reallyspecial honeys, but, you know,
bees only make a certain amountof it, and you know, there's a

(15:47):
lot of other things that go onin the industry, big companies
buying up this really good honeyand then blending it with like
cheap imported honey. So

Ellen (15:57):
maybe this is a true crime podcast

Trevor (16:00):
into one right now, between what they spray on
organic food and and this, it'stough stuff

Ellen (16:06):
well, and I think the flavors of it all is the part
that is so interesting when wegot your kit. And I know Trevor
wanted to talk about that alittle bit. But do they also in
counterfeit honey is flavoradded as well? And I want to
talk about how we know thedifference between that and get
into your amazing palette andtasting. So

Marina (16:25):
if they add a flavor to it again, they have to declare
it on the label. But more thananything else, I think what
they're doing is just buying upa lot of cheap honey and
blending it to have a certainplay flavor profile. But for me
and anybody who tastes it sideby side with, like, a good
quality honey. It's so flat,like it's the plastic bear,

(16:48):
yeah, it's, yeah, the flavor. Ithas no flavor. It's just sweet.
So the thing with real, youknow, local, you know us, you
know good quality honey, is thatthere's flavor, there's a
complexity to flavor, and youdon't get that with commercial
honey.

Trevor (17:07):
I think that's one of the things that was so
fascinating about this littlesampler box that that my dad
got, was that you have thistasting wheel, which I've never
seen before. I didn't even knowthat that existed as a concept
that you know, you know wine,and you have the ability to
taste different kinds of winesand olive oil, sometimes even

(17:30):
you know, but, but to have honeyand to have it represented so
clearly as a consumer, and haveit truly be local, I was
absolutely just totally blownaway. Because, how do all these
different flavors occur? Becauseyou see on the labels, you know,
it's wildflower honey or berryhoney or orange honey, and you

(17:53):
sort of get some of that, buttell us a little more about how
those flavors come come to be.

Marina (18:00):
So that was what really fascinated me about honey, is
that, you know, my honey, everyseason changed a little bit, you
know, flavor, color. And as Imet other beekeepers and started
traveling and collecting honey,I started to realize, wow,
there's a whole world out there.
There's all these differentflowers, and when bees visit
different flowers. They'regathering the nectar, and this

(18:21):
is what imparts the flavor. It'sreally the botanical source. The
bee adds some enzymes into it,but also the environment, the
soil. You know, it's going backto the whole thing, like wine,
like terroir, it's theenvironment conditions that
bring on these differentflavors, and that was just so

(18:42):
fascinating to me, and I startedmy next journey, which was the
honey journey. So I hadcollected, at one point,
probably 75 jars of honey fromtravels and friends and people
were giving me honey, and Ibecame obsessed, right?

Ellen (19:04):
I have this image of, just like the of people, of all
the honey collectors and thebeekeepers going around with
this amazing case, with thesevials of just this liquid gold
and all these colors, becauseyou said you're exchanging,
that's amazing. So,

Marina (19:18):
yeah, we're trading honey. And so I had this shelf
in my house, right? And honeyfrom all over the world,
beautiful labels, colors. Andevery day I would walk by this
beautiful shelf, and I'm like,tasted here and there. I had no
words how to describe it. I hadno tools in my brain to

(19:38):
appreciate it. And I'm like,something's wrong with this
picture. So that's when I fellinto the next rabbit hole, and I
started asking beekeepers thatwere much more experienced to
me. So, you know, I'm abeekeeper, and if my bees are
visiting clover, what should myhoney taste like? And if my bees
are visiting, you know. Lindentrees. What should my honey

(20:02):
taste like? And it wasdismissed. Nobody had any clue,
and any knowledge, or even theworst part is they didn't care.
And I came back from a foodiebackground, and I'm thinking,
I've got all these honeys here.
What do I do with it. So Ifigured that I would go and
learn wine tasting and thentransfer it to honey. So I took

(20:26):
a job. Oh, that's incredible.
That is so cool. I took a jobbecause I wanted to learn how to
taste. So I took a job with anItalian Honey Honey importer,
wine importer, and I spent like,six weeks with their sommeliers
getting trained, and they wantedme to be a salesperson. So I

(20:47):
spent six weeks learningvocabulary, how to taste, how to
smell, and this whole thing. AndI was really thrilled with this,
but then they wanted me to gosell, and I'm not a salesperson,
so I had to, like, walk awayfrom that, but I wanted the
training, and I was still on thehunt, because I figured there
had to be a database somewherethat says, When my bees visit

(21:11):
clover, that my honey is goingto be grassy, like hey, and I'm
going to get this cinnamon note,and when my bees visit
eucalyptus, it's going to havethis animal kind of funkiness
and brothy. And I ended up inItaly going to taste wine in
Montalcino. So we're drivingaround, like stopping at these

(21:32):
wineries, and we roll into thistown and there's a honey
festival going on. Oh, howfortune is right. Wow. And
there's a sign that says lachitadel Miele, which means the honey
city, the city of honey. I'mlike, No,

Trevor (21:49):
this is my place, right?

Marina (21:51):
So I walk in, and it's a big honey festival, yeah. And
there's beekeepers selling alltheir honeys on the table, and I
walk around, and every honey hadthe name of the botanical
source. And I'm thinking, how dothey know that? So I'm walking
around more, and there's peopledoing a honey tasting in the

(22:12):
corner, and they had honey linedup in wine glasses like a
rainbow. And I had never seenthat before. I'd never seen so
many honeys lined up by thecollar. My eyes popped out of my
head and I said, What are youdoing? We're doing a honey
tasting. And it's like, oh mygosh. This is like, out of this

(22:33):
world, right? So I stuck around,and basically what they did is
they took each honey container,you know, the wine glass. And
they passed it around, and theywere telling us the botanical
source, like this is Chestnuthoney. It should be dark amber
in color, and you should smellaromatics and it's Woody, and

(22:54):
you should have this Marseillesoap smell. And you should
everything you wanted,everything I wanted. And they
went through 18 honeys, and Ithought, Oh my gosh. How do you
know this? So I started talkingto them, and they said, We have
honey school here. It's inBologna. Of course,

Ellen (23:13):
it's Italy. Yeah,

Trevor (23:14):
of course, Everything good is Italy. Of course, no
accents, one or two. It's a lotof Italy today. We may have to
get a couple accents in well,

Marina (23:25):
Italy is the leading country in honey discovery,
honey literacy, honey tasting.
Well, you know, they do wine,they do olive oil. And why not?
Makes sense doing honey. So Icome back and I'm posting all
these pictures of the honeyFestival and the honey and
somebody reaches out to me inItaly on social media, and it's

(23:46):
like, come to honey school. I'mlike, Really, when is it so? PS,
six months later, I'm on a planeagain. Actually, the first class
was in Sardinia, and I show up,and there's the guy that was
emailing me, he was the teacher.
He was the teacher. And I wentfor four days of honey school,

(24:11):
and it was literally everythingthat I wanted to know. It was
tasting, writing, tasting notes,learning the botanical sources,
what part of the region it wasproduced, what season, what the
color should be, what the flavorshould be, and at the end of the
course, you have to be able toidentify 18 different honeys, a

(24:36):
big test by smell and tastealone, like a Somalian song,
right?

Ellen (24:41):
Right? I know I'm thinking essence of garden hose,
because from song, right? Everseen that movie? That's
incredible. But how validating,because you're like, I knew you
had this innate sense that thiswas going this, this should
exist, and there was

Marina (24:56):
crazy. Yeah, I'm crazy.
You know, these are the crazythings you. These are the Crazy
things I do, right? Crazy good.
So I ended up just continuingthe program. Actually. They were
like, I was the first, like, Iwas the only American there. It
was all Italians. It was all inItalian. And they kept saying,
Well, why are you here? And Isaid, Well, I want to learn

(25:16):
about honey. And they're like,don't you have honey school back
in the US. I'm like, No, notyet, not yet. So PS, I ended up
going back, and I completed theprogram, and I passed the exam,
and I became a member, and thenI worked 10 years teaching to
become like an official teacher.
So now I get to travel and teachhoney. That's amazing, and taste

(25:41):
honey,

Trevor (25:44):
best job ever. And so now, listeners, something
special is going to happen todayon this episode of yard to
table. Now, what you can't see,but I can see and I can see it.
Ellen can see it, and Marina cansee it, is that she has brought
us an amazing flight of localhoneys for us to try, and we're

(26:05):
going to get a little bit ofsome talent education. Very
excited. So So lead us. Lead us.
Tell us. This is our first

Marina (26:19):
This is your first honey tasting.

Ellen (26:21):
This is my first honey tasting, other than the one we
did on our own, which I'm surewe did incorrectly now, based on
all of this.

Marina (26:30):
So the first honey we're gonna start with is a very light
this is a linden honey from abasswood tree. They grow all
over the East Coast. She'staking notes already. I love it.
This is big. So the first thingwe do is we look at the color,
same as wine, you know, this isthe same process. We look at it.

(26:50):
The second thing we do is,before we taste, we smell.

Ellen (26:52):
So just like wine, you do a little sniff,

Marina (26:56):
but what you'll do is you'll smear the honey around
the container the same way thata wine swirl Gotcha. And the
reason that we do that isbecause we're moving the
molecules around, and weactually experience flavor in
our nose. Your tongue can onlyexperience sweet, sour, salt and

(27:19):
bitter, but our nose is where weget all the

Ellen (27:22):
flavor. And this first honey is what, again,

Marina (27:26):
that's a linden honey.
It's a summer honey. It's atree, the basswood tree. It's a

Ellen (27:31):
very golden, clear honey.

Trevor (27:34):
It has a lot of transparency to it, and there's
a lot of bubbles, and it's veryeasy to it's easy to move
around, and it flows as youwould expect. What we would all
do a traditional honey, and I'vejust spilled it all over the
glass to taste, to taste it,because it's getting sticky here
on Yard to Table.

Ellen (27:54):
This is where it's good to be a husband and wife team.
We can, we can share the tools.

Trevor (27:57):
Well, we have plenty of little spoons there. Wow. Well,

Ellen (28:02):
I just don't want to wait for it. That was really my
thing. Yeah, all right, so I'mtaking the Linden.

Marina (28:08):
So it's like a delicate honey, very, very light, very
light. It's fruity. It's got alittle bit of a vegetal note, we
call, like a plant based it alsohas notes of like a minty finish
you might find in there.

Ellen (28:25):
And is it important where you taste it on your
tongue with honey, or you justput it in?

Marina (28:30):
Yeah, I would put it on my tongue, and then I let it
melt and move all around, andthen you add some saliva,
because it helps with the teasting and then inhale. It goes
up through your nose to yourolfactory bulb. Oh, wow. Also,

Trevor (28:46):
there's a, there's a little sparkliness that I'm
getting on the palette. It'salmost a little. That's, yeah,
that's what that word is.

Marina (28:55):
But that's the minty ending. Yeah, there's a little,
but I like that on the tongue.

Trevor (29:01):
It's a little electric finish. That's what that is.

Ellen (29:04):
That's delicious. It's very light, but I can, I can
taste the mint. I can taste thatvery much. So it's, yeah,

Trevor (29:11):
all right, so that's our first one. Are we going by
color? Are we just skippingaround? Okay, we're

Marina (29:16):
gonna go lightest to dark. All right. And the second
honey I brought for you isyou're gonna know it's
crystallized. And I know wetalked about the teddy bear
being crystallized,

Ellen (29:28):
but is that a bad thing for honey to be crystallized?

Marina (29:31):
Crystallization is actually a sign of quality, but
it's the quality of the crystalsthat matter. So okay, this, you
can see it's crystallizedthroughout, almost like peanut
butter. But when you see thoseteddy bears, the they separate,
there's always like, liquid withcrystals, a little crust,

(29:52):
almost, right? Yeah, that, youknow, liquid mix with crystals
is usually a sign that it's beenhighly. Heated, okay, definitely
heat treated, but it should beeven throughout. And this is a
sign of quality. This means,really, you know, good quality,
honey.

Ellen (30:11):
And you can see it for our listeners. You can't see it,
but it is a, it is a consistent,you know, crystallization. It's
coating that inside of theglass. And it's just a lovely,
little creamy, creamy, whitishivory, ish color. It's like

Trevor (30:25):
an ivory, little tan, very calming, very soothing. And
when I'm smelling this, I'mgetting a little bit of vanilla.
I'm getting a little bit ofalmost like a sandalwood, or
like a an oaky Woody,

Marina (30:36):
kind of like a hay, dry grass hay. Yeah,

Trevor (30:41):
a little bit of a

Ellen (30:45):
swirl. It around,

Trevor (30:46):
swirled around. I've been swirling this. I'm about to
swirl myself.

Ellen (30:50):
And the name of this one again, Marina?

Marina (30:52):
So this is a clover, honey clover. This is not the
clover you get in the grocerystore. This is like the sweet
clovers.

Trevor (31:00):
Holy smokes. That is a very amazing flavor.

Marina (31:05):
This one is produced in the Dakotas in the prairies,
where there is lots of prairies,land dedicated to growing all
kinds of clover for livestock.
But the bees pollinate this. Andthis is nothing like the clover
in the store, right? Oh my gosh,not even close. And it has such

(31:25):
complexity of flavor, wow. It'slike dried grass hay. Got that k
100% almost like sweet tobacco.

Trevor (31:37):
Yes, that's, that's what it is. It's like walking into a
tobacco store, and you'resmelling pipe tobacco, and it's
that sweet vegetable, you know,vegetal, grass, what it was,
that's what I was looking for.
You know, you should think aboutbecoming like a honey sommelier,
just because you kind of knowwhat I'm thinking. I'm reading
your mind. It's amazing. Wow. Ora psychic, one or the other. I

(31:59):
will say that was, I am justvery sorry that everyone
listening to this podcast cannotbe here in the studio with us,
because this is a very specialgood time that we're having, and
that almost doesn't taste likehoney. No, right? It's so
complex that it, you know, it isbecause there are some of those
common notes that you associatewith honey, but it is so far

(32:20):
away from...

Ellen (32:24):
just the way it tastes on your tongue, right
consistency, oh, oh, boy, mygoodness. Oh, wait, we got
another one coming. Can't wait.

Marina (32:33):
So this is a little bit darker. You'll notice it's like
more in the like, like acaramel. Like, caramel, yeah,
this is really special. I don'thave a lot of this honey. Oh,
I'm excited. But this is, webelieve it to be chestnut,
which, we had chestnuts here inthe US, but the Blight took them
out.

Ellen (32:53):
Yeah, there were. It was very, very prolific in the in
the US. Yeah,

Marina (32:58):
we don't have chestnuts, but

Trevor (32:59):
Italy does in Yeah, they have a lot of the chest.

Marina (33:02):
But this is a US produced one, really, yeah, one
of my friends in Pittsburgh, shegave me a sample, and we were
trained on Chestnut honey inItaly. This is American Chestnut
honey. So you'll notice that,wow, it has such a great nose.
It's savory, it's bitter.

Ellen (33:22):
So when we're talking about how we know where the bees
are going, are the hives inliterally a grove of chestnuts?
Is that where they're going? Ordo we know, because bees travel
far, right? So they're tell us alittle bit about that.

Marina (33:36):
So bees will travel four miles from their hive, but we
also have to consider thatdifferent flowers are blooming
at different cycles anddifferent seasons. So right now,
when the chestnuts are bloomingprimarily, the bees will go to
that plant, but when there'sother things, you know mixed in,

(33:58):
you won't get a honey that istruly chestnut, but this one is
really resembles what we weretrained on.

Ellen (34:05):
It's so interesting because when you said savory, I
thought, Oh, mommy, yes. And Ithought, No, it can't be savory.
Now I have to this the smellalone.

Trevor (34:14):
I'm getting that it has smoky notes. You know, we talk a
lot on the podcast about ahamoments that we have when we're
It's banana, by the way, thisChestnut honey is unreal.

Marina (34:27):
Its fabulous.

Ellen (34:29):
It's dark and Woody, yes, wow, Smokey. It's perfect
for spicy the day that we havetoday. Oh yeah,

Trevor (34:36):
it's a little bit rainy, which is a little chilly, very
welcome. But even these ahamoments that we have, where we
where we try something for thefirst time, like snapping off
our fresh asparagus, or rightfrom the garden, what raw
asparagus that you've just growntastes like, and how different
that is from what you buy in thestore, or brown cherries or

(34:56):
whatever this Chestnut honey isabsolutely. Be shocking in the
best possible way.

Ellen (35:03):
I'm just taking it in, right? Honestly, it's so it's so
unusual and so delicious and oh,I don't have the words, because
I'm not trained, but

Marina (35:14):
I think it's delicious, right? It's like nothing you buy
in the store.

Ellen (35:18):
I've never tasted, never had anything even

Trevor (35:20):
remotely close to that.
That's

Marina (35:21):
crazy. So the last one is Weston honey. Oh, this is my
honey. I love it. We love redbee honey. And you can see
that...

Trevor (35:30):
We eat a lot of red bee honey, by the way,

Marina (35:32):
it's super cloudy, yeah.
And, you know, I do very minimalstraining on this one. So
there's, like, pieces of wax init. There's a lot of foams and
everything that's medicine, likethat's gonna cure today. You
know, the rainy, cold, bitter

Ellen (35:54):
while Trevor is sniffing and twisting anybody,

Trevor (35:57):
I'm not giving anybody any of this,

Ellen (35:59):
he's getting into it, tales of his history.

Trevor (36:01):
Oh my god. I'm sorry.
I'm like having a moment overhere. I know everybody's trying
to talk about honey is medicine.

Ellen (36:07):
You keep handing these to me without the spoon, because
I know, I know you know he's ahoney hog,

Trevor (36:17):
well documented. Marina, I have to pause this on we're
gonna get back to honey asmedicine, because it's a
fascinating because it's afascinating, yes, literally
millennia people have been usinglet's give red be its moment. I
have to, because I've beenbuying Red Bee Honey very
consistently. Since we've movedto Weston, I have bought our

(36:37):
local grocery store Lily's outof Red Bee.

Marina (36:39):
Oh, you're the one. They call me and say somebody just
came in here and bought a dozenhoney

Trevor (36:45):
that would be me, because we give them away to
people and we eat themourselves. Where did where this?
This is your honey. This tastesfruity. I've never tasted
anything like this. This isunbelievable.

Marina (37:00):
This is what Weston tastes like, and it's good.
Yeah, it tastes good. It's, youknow, we have a lot of, there's
all of these different,

Ellen (37:08):
very fruity, very sweet, but not sweet in a coin way.
It's just got a sharpness withthe sweet fruitiness.
Very fruity. Yeah, we have

Trevor (37:17):
candy or something. I can't even use the right words,

Marina (37:20):
like brown sugar a little bit. It's a little bit
of,

Ellen (37:24):
bring it back to Trevor.

Trevor (37:26):
This is like, I'm gonna do shots here in a minute. Wow.
All right. So while I'm, whileI'm scarfing all of this,
please, please

Ellen (37:35):
Yeah. So we'll talk, talk a little bit about the
medicine of it all, the the thehealth benefits of honey and
what people have been lookingfor through time. Tell us a
little bit about honey throughthe ages. So do

Marina (37:47):
yeah, honey originally was used as medicine, and as far
back as the Egyptians, they usedhoney to embalm the mummies and
with propolis and beeswax. Andit's when well documented that
honey has been used topicallyfor wounds and burns, and still
is, yeah and internal digestionulcers. So it's been used, over

(38:12):
years, centuries, as a medicine.
And I think most people canagree that, you know, having a
teaspoon of honey when you havea sore throat is like a cashmere
blanket hugging you, right? Andit doesn't really cure anything,
but it definitely relievessymptoms of allergies and sore
throats and sinuses. Sometimespeople taste honey with me and

(38:37):
their nose starts running, andit's because that activity in
the honey, which I'll talkabout, the chemical composition
of the honey, kind of drains thesinuses, and it helps with
allergies. With people,

Ellen (38:53):
I've heard that. I've heard about ensuring that it's
local, because when we moved toConnecticut, that was one of the
things that we looked at, it waswe get our local honey to help
with allergies. And that's true,right? If it can help you,

Trevor (39:05):
you're taking in the bees have processed all of the
pollen and the other things thatare in the environment, like we
were talking about earlier,yeah.

Marina (39:12):
And, you know, I don't know what the number is for
local, but you really do want tohave fresh honey. You know, the
freshest that you can get. Andlocal should be fresh, because
it's made right there. It has noyou know, travel doesn't have to
travel to you. But there aresome chemical composition
properties of honey that arevery, very unique, that no other

(39:34):
food has. And this gives itthese amazing benefits. So one
of the things is that honey isvery acidic and it has a very,
very low pH. And for thisreason, a lot of bacteria and
pathogens can't survive in thehoney environment. Oh, that's
interesting, yeah. So veryacidic antiseptic. It's

(39:56):
antiseptic. And then also the.
Adds certain enzymes to itcalled glucose oxidase, which
changes the glucose in the honeyto hydrogen peroxide. Oh, wow,
for a very short period of time,just a little bit. But this is
another benefit of theantibacterial properties. Is
this hydrogen peroxide activitybecause of the bees adding their

(40:17):
enzymes. And it also has anotherproperty, where it absorbs
moisture because it'shygroscopic. It's like 80% sugar
and 20% water. So it's alwaystrying to grab moisture. If you
leave a jar of honey open over acouple of weeks, it'll absorb
all kinds of moisture andsmells. It's like a sponge. And

(40:38):
when you put honey on a woundand there is bacteria there, it
will suffocate it by stealingthe moisture that it needs to
survive. Interesting. So thishydroscopic quality of the
honey, again, another reasonthat it makes it antibacterial.
So there is scientific evidencethat honey has these

(41:00):
antibacterial properties.

Trevor (41:04):
That's amazing, and it tastes ridiculous, right?
Because I've you don't want toreally taste hydrogen peroxide
on its own, because it does nottaste as good as this honey. No,
do not do it.

Ellen (41:17):
You don't taste it. No, you're not going to have that.
But can we taste? She justopened something.

Trevor (41:21):
What is this piece of magic?

Marina (41:23):
This is a honey that when I first tasted it in honey
school, that my head explodedbecause I didn't recognize it as
honey.

Trevor (41:31):
And I don't have a lot of head to explode left. I've
already had my head explodedlike four times. I want you to
taste this, because she doesn'taccuse me of hogging, yeah.
Okay.

Marina (41:43):
This is a honey that is produced on the island of
Sardinia, which, you know, is aBlue Zone, right, yeah, where
everything good happens onSardinia. And this is their
honey, their traditional honeythat they have produced for
hundreds of years from a treecalled the strawberry tree,
whoa, and it is nothing what youwould think of honey like It

(42:06):
tastes nothing like what youwould recognize

Trevor (42:10):
if you told me that I was eating honey. What is that
flavor?

Ellen (42:14):
It's so bitter, so bitter, yes, but not a it's not
un it's not not untasty. That'sthe work of coming on, tasty.

Marina (42:22):
This is the bitterest honey produced on the planet.
Wow. And it tastes like, I don'tknow if you like it or not, but
it tastes like licking anashtray.

Ellen (42:36):
What does this pair with?

Marina (42:39):
So one of their traditional foods that they
produce is called ciedas, andit's actually a huge ravioli
that they fry on the top of thestove. And when they take it
off, hot, crispy, they put thehoney on it. It is a treasure.

Trevor (42:56):
It is a it is a very sour flavor. There's I get sort
of sour, the bitterness

Ellen (43:01):
I get, for sure, and it's so bitter. And if you you
don't think that eating anashtray sounds delicious, but I
will tell you smokey. It's smokyagain,

Trevor (43:10):
let's not actually eat an ashtray the same way you're
not actually going to drinkhydrogen peroxide. But this is
very unique.

Marina (43:18):
Yeah, it's it's a curiosity, and it's a little
spicy, yes, and do you get,like, a little crispy, green,
fresh pepper, like, totallypepper, sliced a pepper, right?
Yes, crazy,

Trevor (43:30):
I get that's almost a metallic, a little bit of
metallic tinge to it. Wow, we'rethinking.

Marina (43:38):
So I just wanted you to experience bitter, honey,

Ellen (43:43):
that's phenomenal. This is such an education. We're kind
of going through this, thisconversation. We're kind of
going through your books. Youknow, your first book was
lessons from an accidentalbeekeeper, right? And that was
sort of that whole journey abouthoney changed your life. And
then you wrote the honeyconnoisseur, which is about the
tasting and developing thisincredible palette. And then

(44:05):
you, part of the journey was youtook all the learning that you
had in Italy, and then youcreated an American Society of
tasting. Is that right? Andthen, and now we're at the World
Atlas of honey. So,

Trevor (44:17):
yeah, how did the world?
I mean, we've just been aroundthe world here at the studio,
yeah. But how did that book cometogether? What was the idea to
bring that book to the world theworld Atlas? The world Atlas?
Yeah,

Marina (44:30):
actually, I was asked to write it.

Ellen (44:33):
Isn't that amazing?

Trevor (44:34):
That's always nice when people say you're amazing. Would
you like to do this amazingproject?

Ellen (44:39):
You're a subject matter expert,

Marina (44:41):
exactly. And I, you know, I was flattered. So they
basically, you know, outlinedwhat they wanted, 80 countries.
Part One would be history,culinary, medicine, a little bit
of everything. And then part twowould be, let's go around the
world and talk about. About themost important honeys, the

(45:02):
botanical sources, the bees whomake it, the beekeepers,
rituals, traditions, culturalaspects of honey. It was a
tremendous amount of research, atremendous amount of information
that had to be gathered, andthey presented it to me as well.
Every topic is only 280 words.
And I thought I could do that.

(45:26):
280 words about Iran, you know,South Africa, Australia. I could
do that. Wow. You know, it was alot more than 280 words.

Ellen (45:37):
Trevor, can you relate to have struggles with word
count? . Yeah, writing journeys,

Trevor (45:43):
Sometimes it's hard, blank pages are hard. As an
author myself, blank pages arehard. And you think, oh, it's
gonna be fine and easy. And thenyou write something do that, and
then your publisher is like, butyou know what would be better if
you did it totally differently?
And I then you say, Sure, let'stry it.

Marina (45:57):
Yeah. And then they change everything, but it was
about a year and a half ofresearch and writing, and I'm
thankful for my network ofinternational honey friends and
experts and tasters that werevery helpful and instrumental in
getting me samples of thedifferent honeys and telling me
about the, you know, the regionsand The botanical sources.

Trevor (46:20):
So one of my favorite things in the book was seeing
the different ways that bees arekept around the world, because
we, for the most part, know theregular wooden boxes and they're
stacked. I mean, that's whatmost people see and experience,
but in places like Africa and inMicronesia and all these other
places, it's totally different.
They're made of reeds and straw,and like all of these other

(46:44):
things, it's absolutelyfascinating to see how so many
different cultures do the sameprocess and keep bees in a
different way.

Marina (46:54):
Yeah. So the different kinds of hives depends on a few
things. It could be the region,if it's a tropical region, it
could be how they traditionallywere catching wild bees. So
there's a lot of differentvariables in how people kept
bees clay pots, but mainly it'sbecause a lot of the countries

(47:14):
are very poor. They don't havethe access to the traditional
Langstroth beehive thateverybody sees, but none.
Nonetheless, they keep bees,they harvest honey, and you
know, they're doing good for theenvironment well.

Ellen (47:30):
And the book is beautiful. So I mean, not only
is it full of all the incredibleresearch that you have, and you
I mean, from the beginning, justeven about what beekeeping is.
Again, you do that in a lovelyway, and then starting to see
just how bees and honey arehandled around the world. The
pictures are gorgeous. You talkabout, like so much of the

(47:50):
world, I think this was in thisbook, or one of your other books
about so much of our world'sfood, in general, is dependent
on the honeybees. I can'tremember what the percentage
was, but it was a big percentageof world food that was dependent
on the honey bees. And here atStone Brook, we are organic. We
care about our pollinators inevery way possible. We don't use
chemicals. How, in your opinion,and obviously, now with this

(48:13):
world view that you have, how dowe support the bees wherever we
live, and create an environmentfor them to thrive?

Marina (48:19):
That's a great question, because a lot of people want to
help the bees, but necessarily,they don't want to become a
beekeeper, and you don't have tojust planting, you know,
planting pollinator friendlyflowers, whether it's a tree,
herbs, plants, you know, anykind of flower that you can
plant that's going to providenectar and pollen throughout the

(48:43):
season. So spring, summer, fall,they need to eat all throughout
the season. And there arespecific flowers that are
pollinator friendly. And a lotof the nurseries and garden
centers have their littlepollinator section, and they're
very knowledgeable now, becauseeverybody's on board with this,
and the most important thing isthis, no mow May and not mowing,

(49:08):
and getting away from thismentality of having to have a
perfectly green lawn, andrealizing that dandelions and
clovers are beautiful and arevery important sources of nectar
and pollen for bees and otherpollinators. So, you know, try

(49:28):
to fall in love with wildflowersand change the conversation from
weed to flower, because weedstend to be negative. But if you
really look at dandelions,they're so beautiful, those
beautiful golden heads that popup in the spring, and so
important for them in the earlypart of the season. They need

(49:51):
that to feed their young, sothat the colony can grow and
become robust and to pollinatefor wildlife. You know, they're
pollinating plants. And so thatthere's nuts and seeds and
berries for birds and deer. Sothey are not only providing food
for us, but for the wildlifethat sustains them.

Ellen (50:10):
It's so important that you mention that because I think
one of the things that weobviously, we don't, we don't
use chemicals on the lawn, wenotice the difference in our
time going into four years thatwe've been here this may it's
that we have fireflies again. Wefirst moved here, we didn't have
fireflies. And I thought, oh,we'll see fireflies at night,
and they come back because we'renot spraying. We allow Clover to

(50:34):
come up.

Trevor (50:34):
And we love clover in our lawn. It's beautiful.

Ellen (50:38):
And it's some of the first things that come up that
the bees get a chance to drawfrom. And again, that's an
education process that we wentunder. But it's just also
beautiful. To your point, it'sjust so pretty to see the little
white flowers and the yellowdandelions and and manage that
in a little one that's a littlewild, is okay?

Marina (50:56):
It's okay. Yeah, we're gonna survive without, you know
the MO and blow guys, that'sright, but you know, you can
walk through your clover in youryard and just watch the
pollinators bobbing around. It'sso peaceful and grounding. I
think, you know that's partlywhat what beekeeping did is that
it connected me to nature andgrounded me. And you know, when

(51:20):
you're an author and you're busyand you're doing all kinds of
things you just want to, like,connect to the ground in the
earth, and you know, bees dothat

Ellen (51:29):
. It really has impacted your relationship with nature,
exactly, yeah,

Marina (51:33):
in a way that I could never imagine.

Trevor (51:35):
Yeah, I love that. A little different than SVA.

Marina (51:40):
Well, I did spend time there, and I'm grateful for that
experience, because I think itmade me who I am today. You
know, it added to the wholepackage 100% so we have
honeycomb here.

Ellen (51:55):
Oh, Honeycomb.

Trevor (51:57):
See, I was seeing that in the middle of this amazing
little parade of good, goodness.

Ellen (52:03):
And again, you can't see listeners, I'm so sorry, but
Marina has made a beautifulplate on a gorgeous piece of
wood, some honeycomb. I seecheese. What else is there?

Marina (52:12):
There's some walnuts.
And you know, the best partabout honey is besides tasting
it, is eating it with cheeses.

Ellen (52:21):
And we wanted to talk about that the foods
complimentary foods with honey.

Marina (52:25):
Well, honey goes with every food group. Okay? So you
can have meat, fish, you canhave vegetables, salad
dressings, but my favorite ischeese, and I'm going to invite
you to take a cracker and spreada little goat cheese on it, yes
please, and take a chunk of thehoney comb I'm gonna make you

(52:47):
wanna thank you. And I broughtsome walnuts to add a little
crunchy texture to it. I'm soldon all of it. And this is lunch.

Ellen (52:58):
Oh, I love it. I love it so much. You know, it's
interesting you talk about saladdressings again. You know, your
education comes with just, Ithink living here, I never made
a salad dressing with honey, andthis, you know, now, that's one
of our go tos. It's a littlelemon, olive oil, honey, some
herbs, delicious, fresh. I don'tthink we've bought a jar of

(53:21):
salad dressing.

Marina (53:22):
No, I buy nothing.

Ellen (53:26):
Should I wait for you to try or should I go for it? Oh,
you're too polite.

Marina (53:29):
I'm gonna join you.
Please do this. Can be breakfastevery day. Oh, my goodness. So I
love honeycomb with like softcheeses. Ricotta is my favorite.

Ellen (53:45):
Im chewing into the mic.
This is an ASMR.

Marina (53:50):
Okay, what is ASMR?

Ellen (53:52):
Have you seen those videos where people just make a
continuous sound sensoryexperience, which is definitely
a sensory experience. Oh, mygoodness, sometimes,

Marina (54:01):
but right now, it never gets old.

Ellen (54:04):
Oh my gosh. With with the goat cheese, wow. So,
Marina, you're coming back nextweek, right? Are you? We're
gonna do some more tastings nextweek.

Marina (54:14):
Tomorrow, I'll be back tomorrow with five more honeys
that we can taste from differentplaces.

Ellen (54:18):
Oh, my goodness, I know I don't know. I want to get
through that cabinet of 75 Wow,was it? It must be more than
that.

Marina (54:24):
Now, well, after my training, I learned about honey.
I learned, you know, what goodhoney was, what bad honey was, I
was able to taste them. So Itook my training, went to my
cabinet, started tasting thehoneys. Hey, I'm an expert. Now,
right? Started to realize thisone is old. This one's
crystallized. It has like anincomplete structure, the colors

(54:47):
wrong on this. And I learnedbasically that honey does not
get better with age, and thatthe honeys that were in plastic
started to leach in. Oh, wow. Icouldn't keep them, and most of
them ended up getting. Beingtossed. Because, wow, I had had
them for three to five years,and at that point for me, it's a
little bit old. Honey is besteaten fresh, you know, right out

(55:10):
of the hive During the same yearor the second year harvest. You
know, I was collecting for awhile, so I really had to toss
them because my palate hadalready sort of become
sophisticated, and I was notenjoying any of them. They were
old,

Trevor (55:26):
interesting, because I've heard that there is a
because it is anaerobic, that itcan last forever.

Marina (55:32):
It could last forever, and it's it may be edible, but
it doesn't taste good, andthat's the problem. So, yeah,
they found honey in the tombs,and you're not, you're not
trying that. Yeah, I'm still,that's my that's on my bucket
list, to try to find somebody toget me some of that King Tut

(55:53):
honey, the King

Trevor (55:54):
Tut business, I would try, and I 100% would try it.

Marina (55:58):
But, you know, it's edible. You know, you can still
eat it, but it doesn't tastegood and it has no more health
benefits. You know that 3000year old honey?

Trevor (56:06):
It's, feels like it's an old thing, yeah? But that's, you
know? Why not give it a shot?

Ellen (56:10):
I like it. Now. We tried this amazing honey from Italy.
Are there any other varietalsfrom around the world that you
love? Yeah?

Trevor (56:19):
What's your favorite?
Favorite? Favorite. I didn'tknow it's like choosing Your
Favorite Kid

Ellen (56:21):
Italian probably, favorite Italian?

Marina (56:24):
or, yeah, I do like Italian honey. And the reason
that their honey is good is thereason that all their food is
good, and it's because they takecare of their environment. They
don't use a lot of pesticides,they use traditional methods,
and their food is verycontrolled there. They're very
about good food. Don't mess withour food. So their honey is just

(56:45):
as good. But I've tasted somereally interesting honeys. I
actually brought one from NewZealand. Oh, sorry, from
Tasmania. This is Leatherwoodhoney from Tasmania. Wow. And a
friend, a new friend that, fromhis eyes right now, a new
friends gave me this, and it isone of the most complex honeys

(57:09):
that you'll ever taste. Leatherwood. Is that? What we said,
leather wood, it tastes like arain forest where it comes from.

Ellen (57:18):
Wow. What notes are you getting there? Oh, that face he
just made. It's perplexed.

Marina (57:23):
It's everything.

Ellen (57:25):
Oh, my gosh.

Marina (57:33):
It's musty. It's like dried leaves. It's aromatic.
It's floral, like magnolias,

Trevor (57:41):
yes. What is that smell that I'm smelling?

Marina (57:44):
rainforest,, the tropical rainforest. It's

Ellen (57:47):
almost right. It's almost like that moldy layer of
leaves. Is that right? Yeah,

Marina (57:52):
dampness.

Ellen (57:55):
Now that again, that may not sound appetizing, but it is,
but it is delicious, right?
Ashtrays, moldy leaves.

Trevor (58:05):
There's also, like, a liquor, liquor, liqueur, yeah,
flavor licorice, yeah,

Marina (58:11):
pretty good. You should go to honey school.

Trevor (58:14):
I'm there, by the way, whenever it's a next semester,
Sign me up. Wow, May at myplace. Oh, you got it. We're
there. We're there. It's a shortdrive

Ellen (58:26):
that is very interesting.

Marina (58:27):
Yeah, very interesting.
That's one of my favorites. Andsomebody gave me some honeydew
from Transylvania that is sointeresting. It's like sour. And
if you don't know what honeydewis, honeydew is When bees gather
the secretions of differentaphids that live on trees and
different plants. So there areaphids that live on these

(58:49):
evergreen coniferous trees, andthey will suck up all the like
resins and this, you know, sweetsucrose saps and things like
that. Yeah. And then they'llleave back the secretions
droppings, and then the beeswill go pick this up, and they
make honeydew from it. They makehoney from it. It's called

(59:10):
honeydew because it involves theaphids or the leaf hoppers and
the bees. And it's usuallyreally dark, and sometimes it's
got a resin note, but thisparticular one is really sour,
sour honey. People think honeyis sweet, but it has a very
interesting apple pie kind ofsavory sour note that I just

(59:32):
love.

Trevor (59:35):
I think it's I'm 100% blown away by that, because I
know that a lot of times antswill do certain things with
aphids and that sort of Colonystructure, and they'll keep
aphids and milk aphids fordifferent kinds of secretions
and things like that. ForThere's honey ants and other
other kinds of ants that dothat. I had no idea that bees
also used in certain societiesother species. I thought they

(59:59):
were. Exclusively justpollinators.

Marina (01:00:03):
No, they, you know, they work with other insects. And on
a whole nother note, you'reaware of the spotted lantern
fly, this invasive kind ofinsect looks come off, but yep,
for colors, right? So these arealso like living on the tree of

(01:00:23):
the Tree of Heaven by Lantustree, and they're leaving their
secretions. And the bees aregathering the spotted lantern
secretions and making spotterlantern fly honey. No and
beekeepers, beekeepers now inPennsylvania, and certain parts
of New Jersey are flipping outbecause their honey is now dark

(01:00:47):
and they don't recognize it.
Wow, and now it's being testedand studied at the University of
Pittsburgh as honeydew fromspotted lanternfly.

Ellen (01:00:58):
Whoa. Now, is that not a good thing, or we don't know
yet.

Marina (01:01:03):
It's we don't know yet, but it is what it is. And the
spotted lantern flies are here.
Yeah, they are. They're notgoing away. Like it or not. They
like it. And eventually theywill adapt, and there will be
predators that will, you know,start the food chain and start
eating them. But we now havespotted lantern fly, Honey, do,

(01:01:25):
and there's some beekeepersselling it as doomsday honey.

Trevor (01:01:33):
I love that. I did say that on a previous episode. Why
are we call it the lanternflyer, the Tree of Heaven. It's
so pretty. There's so nicenames. They should be doomsday
honey. I'm there. Was

Ellen (01:01:43):
so common for us to bring things from other places.
We talk a lot about natives andinvasive plants. Our actions
have consequences, good and bad,exactly.

Marina (01:01:52):
And Tree of Heaven is invasive, right, right? And I
will just say that the honeyfrom Tree of Heaven is
delicious. And bees are notnative so they're alert, so they
do like non native plants,right? Wow. So you know, and I
know a lot of people, you know,let's pull out the knot weed.
Let's pull out, great, but youmust replace it with something

(01:02:14):
that blooms at the same time,because the knotweed, again, we
have not weed honey, and if youpull it out, the bees are going
to look for sources of nectar atthe end of the summer, so you
must replant something becausethey're going to be hungry. Wow.
So yeah, our actions haveconsequences and and

Ellen (01:02:34):
we have to think through the next step. It's not just one
step, right? We have to thinkabout what comes next after
that. That makes, that makes alot of sense.

Marina (01:02:42):
Yeah, so, you know, beekeeping really has opened my
eyes to, you know, theenvironment, what's going on,
the balance the weather. Youknow, what's blooming when? And
you know, as a beekeeper, youhave to be sort of a
meteorologist, you have to be,you know, a veterinarian. You
have to know behavior, abiologist. You're you're a

(01:03:02):
doctor, if you're using honey asmedicine, you know you have to
know so many different skills,and it takes years to kind of
get them all working together.
But beekeepers aren't reallyinteresting people, and that's
what I loved about joining thebee club, is that everybody was
a wealth of knowledge. Oh, well,

Ellen (01:03:21):
it's been a wealth of knowledge.

Trevor (01:03:25):
It's all working. I'll tell you that it's all working,
and we've taken up just, I mean,I'm just, I don't want it to
end, I know,

Ellen (01:03:33):
but thank you, Marina. I can't thank you enough. This has
been such an education and ajoyful experience, and I know
that my mind has been blown manytimes in a good way. Yeah, thank
you. Thank you for coming onyour table. Thank

Marina (01:03:49):
you for indulging in honey with me.

Ellen (01:03:51):
The best day ever.
Charles, ready to keep indulging

Trevor (01:03:56):
that one was I'm buzzing right now. Me, personally, I am
buzzed.

Ellen (01:04:04):
It was an educational and epicurean experience. Like
all that alliteration,

Trevor (01:04:10):
it was a it was a radical I just, I don't think
I'm gonna forget

Ellen (01:04:16):
those flavors. You did really well, by the way you
dealt

Trevor (01:04:19):
with with the diagnosis of the varying where it was
from. Course, I would love totake her.

Ellen (01:04:26):
Yeah, I would let's go to Dubai. I think that's when
the next big one's happening.
Yeah, that's

Trevor (01:04:31):
a little further than I thought we were gonna go. But
I'm good. I'm 100% good withgoing

Ellen (01:04:36):
than just going in Weston.

Trevor (01:04:38):
Yes, she's a neighbor.
She's live up the road.

Ellen (01:04:42):
That is true. Well, we know you're all going to want to
follow Marina to learn moreabout the amazing world of being
a honey sommelier. So you can goto her website, which is honey
somalia.com and, of course,follow her on Instagram at honey
Somalia, and we'll have all ofthat information in the show
notes. Of course. If

Trevor (01:05:00):
you're lucky enough to live in Fairfield County,
Connecticut, you can find RedBee Honey at local cheese shops,
local stores just ask for it.
I'm sure that they will be morethan happy to get it. And she
also ships, Oh, that's right,she ships. So you can go to Red
bee.com and you can pick uphoney. And you can pick up books
there too,

Ellen (01:05:21):
absolutely. And you can also follow Red Bee on
Instagram. Oh yeah, it's just@redbee on Instagram. That's
right. Well, it's been a verysweet experience for us.

Trevor (01:05:31):
I see what you did there.

Ellen (01:05:33):
Thanks for being with us and having a seat at our table.

Trevor (01:05:37):
Yard to Table is a production of Macrocosm
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