Miller's Orchard Farm Market

Saturday May 19 2012

Miller's Orchards Farm Market
Real Farmers, Real Food

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UPDATES:

04/05/2012
* Spring 2012 Newsletter coming soon! If you're not on our mailing list, send us an email! (address below, or click here)

* More updates coming soon! Check back often to see what's new!

Honey:

At Miller's Orchards, we have a lot of apple trees. Which means we love honeybees. Apples, like many fruit crops, require honeybees to pollinate the blossoms during the Spring bloom. Bees, in their search for the tantalizing nectar found in lovely flowers, pick up pollen on their fuzzy legs. As they move from blossom to blossom, the pollen brushes off their legs and is deposited into another flower. The pollen enters the stigma of the new flower and fertilization occurs! As we like to tell the students who visit our farm: "That's how baby apples are born!"

For generations the Miller men kept at least one colony of bees on the Farm. The orchards needed them, and the family sold the harvested honey at farmers markets and in our on-farm market. In the 1990s, our native bee colony was weakened by a mite and then finished off by a hungry local bear. Because of Wally's busy farm schedule during those years, the farm opted to contract with other local bee-keepers to maintain "rented" colonies on our farm. And in the meantime, we discovered the Howland's, a local family of bee-keepers and honey bottlers, to provide us with honey for our Farm Market.

The Howland's are what we like to call "the real thing." They are committed to traditional bee-keeping methods and bottle their honey pure (no added corn syrup or other sweetners.) When you buy Howland's Honey at our Farm Market, you are getting 100% pure honey--the only food on earth that will never spoil!

We offer various varieties of honey year-round in the Farm Market. Our customers often ask us to explain the differences between the varieties. Simply put, honey comes from the nectar of various flowering plants, and the honey's taste takes on the characteristics of the plants from which it was derived. Because different plants flower at different times of the year, it is relatively easy to isolate the honeys derived from the various nectars. Because the honey is so closely linked to the plant nectar, honey is often recommended as a defense against the pollen that frustrates seasonal allergy sufferers.

Honey Varieties

Apple Blossom	Light color honey with light fruit overtone. Excellent as a spread and in baking.
Basswood	Light honey with a crisp, clean taste. Somewhat more rare in Northeast U.S. from a quick-blooming tree.
Buckwheatm	Strong, dark honey w/molasses & malt overtones and hint of an aftertaste. Rich in nutrients (esp iron). Often called the "man's honey."
Clover	Light honey with a sweet, mild taste. An abundant nectar in the Eastern U.S. Good all-around honey for tea, spreads, baking, etc.
Honeysuckle	Light honey with a mild, sweet taste. Good for use in teas and as spread.
Orange Blossom	Lighter honey with a fresh, citrusy overtone. Blends nicely w/white & green teas and as a spread. Not from local nectar; pure honey from Florida.
Raspberry	Medium color honey with a tangy, berry overtone. Works well as a spread and in tea.
Starthistle	Medium color honey with a slight zingy tang. Excellent in teas, especially black.
Wildflower	Medium color honey with a mild taste. Good honey for local allergy sufferers as it contains the nectar of various local allergen-producing plants.