Elias Honey....

[newguy]

So I just got back from my bee keepers house and picked up some honey.

20lbs mesquite

10lbs Elias honey

I've never heard of it before. He told me he thought the flower was related to the sunflower. Anyhoo the honey was VERY sweet with an earth grain taste to it. Very interesting.

So I picked up 10 pounds to experiment with.

Have any of you mead makes used this type of honey before? If so what did you like/dis-like?

Cheers,

 

[david_42]

Mesquite mead. I quaff that!

 

[newguy]

yeah David I love me some mesquite honey mead! This batch was extraordinarily good and flavorful to. Dem bee's did a good job!

So no one with a comment on the Elias honey? Am I all alone here? Has anyone heard of this honey?

Funny I started a thread on Gotmead.com with no replies there as well. I'm starting to think I'm all alone on this one.

 

[newguy]

Got this reply from a member at gotmead.com

"Accession number;00A0566725
Title;Breeding of flower color mutant cultivar 'Ray sunrise' of spraytype chrysanthemum (Dendranthema grandiflora) by soft X-ray irradiation.
Author;YAMADA HIDENARI(Shizuoka Agric. Exp. Stn.) BABA FUJIO(Shizuoka Agric. Exp. Stn., Tobu Engei Bunjo) HAGIWARA YOKO(Shizuoka Agric. Exp. Stn.) OTSUKA HISAO(Shizuoka Agric. Exp. Stn.)
Journal Title;Bulletin of the Shizuoka Agricultural Experiment Station
Journal Code:G0601A
ISSN:0583-094X
VOL.;NO.44;PAGE.37-41(1999)
Figure&Table&Reference;FIG.3, TBL.4, REF.6
Pub. Country;Japan
Language;Japanese
Abstract;A new cultivar 'Ray sunrise', a spray-type chrysanthemum, was developed by irradiating soft X-ray acutely to the cultivar 'Elias', and its characteristics were compared with those of the parent. 1. 'Elias' has been one of the most important cultivar in Shizuoka prefecture, and its harvesting time is in September through October. We aimed to breed a new cultivar with a flower color distinct from the parent but other properties were unvaried. 'Ray sunrise was such a mutant cultivar with the major change merely in flower color. 2. Breeding of 'Ray sunrise' started in 1992. Cuttings of 'Elias' were irradiated with 10 to 50Gy soft X-ray. The pedicel tissue of the plants with different flower color was cultured in vitro on 1/2 MS agar medium supplemented with 1mg/l NAA and 1mgl BA. The number of regenerated plantlets was 22 from which 13 breeding lines were selected as flower color mutants. The most superior line 'Orange 16' bearing orange colored flowers was selected through the trials of four years duration. This line was named 'Ray sunrise' in 1997 for cultivar registration. 3. 'Ray sunrise' was somewhat smaller in number of internodes than 'Elias', but was same in the stem length and the weight of cut flowers. Although the flowering time was about 3 days later and the diameter of flower was a little smaller than Elias, other characteristics such as the round-shaped top of ray floret and green top of disk flower were as good as the parent. (author abst.)"


After tasting a few more times I do notice a strong floral charecter to this honey. This should be alot of fun to experiemnt with it.

Still pondering what to do with it. Maybe a cyser or possibly a nice dark berry momel?

Mabye a nice pure traditional mead?

Any suggestions?

 

[z987k]

you only had 10lbs, so I say go with a small batch of a traditional to see how that turns out, and then if you want get some more later and spice/fruit it if it's flavors would accent a spice/fruit/whatever.