Medicinal Herbal Honeys (Making Fennel infused honey)

I'm going to go on a short honey rant quickly. I am in love with honey. First off, as I'm sure you've figured out by now, its a superior sweetener to sugar just for its rich taste. But did you know that it is anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-viral? It is the only food that never goes rancid. Recently there have been studies linking honey intake and prevention of colon cancer. The modern medicine world might finally be tuning into the medicinal uses of honey, but honey has been used in folk remedies for hundreds of years. Its anti-bacterial properties can ward off infections on cuts and burns and it is a great throat soother.

I recently found this great blog called Urban Herbwifery which suggested making herbal honeys. An herbal honey in basically just honey

infused with medicinal herbs. I decided to make Fennel Honey just because I happened to have dried fennel at hand in my dorm room and because fennel aids digestion and can ease gas.

Here is the link to this AWESOME herbal blog with the full list of herbs that work well in herbal honeys, their uses and the full recipe, but below is how I made my Fennel Honey (and it was easy!)

http://urbanherbwifery.wordpress.com/2011/02/20/herbal-preparations-honeys-oxymels-and-elixirs/#more-998

Since fennel seeds are SO tough I just ground it up before I put it in my jar. Below you can see the size difference between the ground up seeds.

After I ground up the seeds I filled up a jar partially. I would have filled the jar half way full if I had enough honey to fill it the rest of the way up but I only had about three quarters a jar of honey so I used less seeds.

I then heated the honey just a little. I put it in the microwave for 20 seconds until it was runnier than normal but not just fully liquidy.

I poured the heated honey over the crushed fennel and mixed it together. And that was basically all of it. I closed up the jar and I'm going to let it stay sealed for a few weeks, flipping the jar upside down every day or so, just so it really will get all mixed together.

Hope that your herbal honey making goes well!