North Carolina Local Honey Bee Cake
Serves 8
This easy, dairy-free, very moist, local honey bee cake will fill your house with a wonderfully sweet and spicy scent as it bakes in the oven. You can think of this cake as a desert and a healthy snack that can help you get through the day. It is delicious served with a hot “cuppa” tea or coffee. Enjoy it mid-morning or early afternoon. No matter when you eat it, it’s sure to put a smile on your face.
Honeybees are dying off for a number of reasons which are classified under (CCD) Colony Collapse Disorder. Some of the factors contributing to this are stress from moving and transporting hives, malnutrition, loss of habitat, disease, nosema, foulbrood, wax moth, climate change, herbicides, chemicals, and pesticides. Scientists are constantly trying to find a way to defeat another cause of honey bee death called varroa destructor also known as the varroa mite. It hitches a ride into the hive on a bee. The larvae from the eggs it lays feed on young bees, and ultimately wipe out the entire hive.
I have come across many different points of view regarding the loss of our honeybees. One theory is that honeybees are not native to the US. That is true. They were brought over by the Europeans, an incredible feat to think of how many died in the process. Enough made it and adapted to life here. Honeybees contribute $14 billion to the value of US crops.
There are those who believe that if honeybees die, mason bees and other native bees can replace them as pollinators. I believe that if we had a smaller human population that would be possible. There is simply no way these native pollinators can fill the commercial demands that the honeybees do. Take a second to think of what honeybees pollinate: fruits, vegetables, herbs, nuts, berries, coffee, cotton, clover, and alfalfa. They support the food, cattle, dairy, coffee and every other industry essential to human life. Ladies, beeswax is often an ingredient of your favorite make up. Of course, I can’t even think about life without the sweet taste of honey.
*Source: www.nwhoneybee.org/images/logo.png
North Carolina Local Honey Bee Cake
Serves 8
Ingredients:
Cake
1 cup local honey (Dancing Bee’s Farms, Monroe, NC)
1 cup unsalted English butter (melted)
2 eggs (free range, if possible), beaten
1 ½ cups self-rising flour, sieved
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Icing:
2 tablespoons confectioners sugar
1 tablespoon local honey (Dancing Bee’s Farms, Monroe, NC)
How to make:
Preheat oven to 350◦F and lightly grease a 7-inch cake tin. Place the honey and melted butter into a large bowl and mix together. Then mix in the eggs, flour and cinnamon.
Spoon into the cake tin and bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until the cake is springy to the touch and shrinking slightly from the sides of the tin.
Cool slightly in the tin before turning out onto a wire rack. While the cake is still warm, make the icing by mixing the sugar and honey together with 2 teaspoons of hot water. Spoon the icing over the cake and allow to set before slicing and serving.