Honey
“I shouldn’t think even millionaires could eat anything nicer than new bread and real butter and honey for tea.”
— Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle
“Licking honey is a cure for all ailments.”
— Imam Jaʿfar Ṣādeq, recorded by Ḥasan b. Fażl Ṭabarsi (d. 1153), Encyclopaedia Iranica
“Kind words are like honey, sweet to the soul and healthy for the body.”
— Proverbs 16:24
This summer, my brother-in-law planted a sunflower field on the farm where he and my sister live. Sunflowers as far as the eye can see! The flowers attracted a swarm of bees; she sent me a video of their loud humming. A local beekeeper will try to draw the bees into one of his hives. He says the honey from bees pollinating a sunflower field will be particularly sweet.
Honey has what wine enthusiasts call terroir—its flavor is inseparable from the place where it is made. Just like you can’t make true Champagne with grapes grown outside France, you can’t make clover honey next to an alfalfa field. Clover honey has a light, simple sweetness—perfect for morning coffee. Alfalfa honey is deeper, thicker, more complex—great drizzled over yogurt with bananas and granola.
I love bringing home a jar of honey as a souvenir of a place I’ve been. And the bittersweet feeling of getting to the end of the jar and knowing you may never get to taste this particular honey again.
Just like a good wine, a good honey feels like artistry. But it isn’t human artistry. Food scientists can make oil that mimics butter, break down corn and reconfigure it into a cookie, even make meat that isn’t. But they’ve never come close on honey.
Because you can’t make honey without bees. A good beekeeper works in partnership with the bees, helping the hive thrive so there is enough honey for the bees—and some for us too.
If you think only of the beekeeper and the bees, making honey looks like reciprocity. That’s a fashionable word these days. But the reality is more complicated than a neat give‑and‑take. A gardener planting flowers might not even know there is a hive nearby, much less expect to share in its honey.
I think about it as karma, not reciprocity. Honey is nature’s reward for acts of care.
Unlike reciprocal transactions—where you know what you are getting—karma doesn’t promise a particular direct return. Acts of karma are brave.
Cynics would rather do nothing than risk criticism for trying to do something good. I can hear their shrill voices now: flowers waste water, honey is just sugar. It is true that well-intentioned acts often have unintended consequences, sometimes harmful.
But the cynics are wrong. Acts of love and kindness make us better. Approaching the world with love, and a little audacity, opens life up for us and those around us. That is the unfailing mechanism of karma.
Sometimes the return is obvious—like a jar of honey that carries the memory of sunflowers. Other times, it’s harder to trace. But kindness always circles back.
Fiat cost: $1.14 per ounce. You can buy cheaper honey, and that’s fine for baking—but for drizzling, I suggest a splurge on good local honey.
Your thoughts on honey, or karma experiences, are welcome below or on our Community Appreciations page.
Like this post? Find out more about this blog here. Subscribe here for the latest updates.
Not Your Fiat Life 
Leave a comment