Our Honey

Premium, Natural Honey

Our Products

The 2012 honey crop is in! Honey is $6.50/lb and available in one pound (16 oz) jars. We also have 6 pound jars available for $30. Unfortunately, we cannot ship the 6 pound jars, but they are available for pick-up or deliver in Watertown, WI and Brookfield, WI areas.
Fresh, local honey makes a great gift for coworkers, clients, neighbors, or friends. If you'd like to add a special touch to your gift, we have gift bags available for $2.50. Make sure you include some of your favorite honey recipes too!
Unfortunately, honey supplies are limited and we sell out every year. As much as we would love to have enough honey for everyone, we feel that is is very important to leave enough for the bees to make it through the long, cold Wisconsin winters. If we don't have enough honey left to fill your order, we will happily keep you informed about when the next harvest will be coming in.

What Makes Our Honey Special

The bees put a lot of effort into making honey. It takes more than 20,000 foraging trips and over 4 million flower visits to make a single pound of honey. Each individual bee will make only a fraction of a teaspoon. In return for their hard work, we give individual attention to every hive and every pound of honey we harvest. Unlike most of the honey you could buy in the store, our honey has been only minimally heated and gently filtered. When you are eating honey from Golden Hills you are getting as close to the hive as possible.

We think it is important to give you the most natural, wholesome product available on the market. We locate colonies where they will have an abundance of high-quality, natural food sources and focus on maintaining overall colony health so we can minimize the amount of treatment our bees require. Proactive management keeps bees healthy and productive while keeping costs down for everyone.

Honey is a colloid, the fancy term for a mixture of particles that won’t settle out and resists filtration. Most of the aroma and flavor that we associate with honey comes from the other substances that come with it, like small quantities of pollen, for example. Most honey is ultra-filtered to remove these important components because stores want a product that will always look and taste the same from jar to jar and will crystalize slowly, if ever. Honey is truly a “vintage” product, similar to the grapes used to make wine. It is these nuances that make a truly superior variety. If you have never tried honey that has been only lightly filtered, you won’t believe the difference and I guarantee you’ll never go back once you’ve tried it! There is some evidence to suggest that eating natural, local honey, may provide allergy relief for some people because of the trace quantities of local pollen.

The process of turning nectar into honey is very complex and not completely understood. Besides reducing the water content from above 50% down to below 18%, the bees add complex proteins, minerals, and enzymes that they produce themselves. These enzymes are responsible for giving honey its unique flavors, as well as its medicinal properties. However, most of them are highly volatile and are quickly destroyed at temperatures above 180F, with many of them breaking down at temperatures as low as 120F. Most of the honey you purchase at the store has been heated well above this level to make it easier to filter and delay the process of crystallization. We never let our honey reach these temperatures. Our philosophy is that delivering a premium, natural product involves staying as close to the hive as you can get!

Varieties

Honey varies widely in taste, color, and smell depending on the nectar sources the bees visit. All honey contains a mixture of nectar from many different types of flowers but one often dominates enough to classify the honey as varietal. The two most common Wisconsin honeys are clover and wildflower honey. Clover honey is sweet, light, and mild. Our honey crop seems to be mostly from alfalfa this year, which is light like clover but has a more distinctive taste. Wildflower honey is darker and has a stronger flavor.

Why does my honey crystalize?

Honey is a complex blend of sugars, enzymes, pollen, and small amounts of nutrients and minerals. These have been shown to confer a whole host of health benefits (besides making honey delicious) but also cause honey to crystalize over time. Crystalization can easily be reversed by placing a jar of honey in hot, but not boiling, water. All honey will eventually crystalize, some in several weeks and others not for several years, depending on the floral source and moisture content. Honey purchased from the store often takes much longer to crystalize because it is highly filtered and heated. This process delays crystalization but also destroys much of flavor and beneficial properties that are naturally present. We only lightly heat and filter our honey under low pressure to preserve the hard work the bees have done.

Although it is very easy to re-liquefy honey, many people find they prefer it this way. In fact, most of the world consumes primarily crystalized honey. Customers report that they enjoy the texture and the fact that this honey is easier to measure and spread. If you choose to liquefy your honey when it begins to crystalize, we recommend putting in a warm water bath on the stove at around 110F until it reaches the desired consistency. More intense heating or placing honey in the microwave will make it stay liquid longer, but will begin to break down many of its natural properties.

You can slow the crystalization process dramatically by placing your honey in the refrigerator or freezer. This slows or halts the natural changes that occur in the sugars over time and won't hurt your honey at all. Some people find this more convenient than repeatedly warming their honey if they prefer it in its most liquid form.