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Honey Sticks 101

A favorite fall treat, these honey-filled straws are a quick way to satisfy a sweet tooth—and to support local beekeeping efforts. They also make great dinner party favors and act as an excellent natural sweetener in your hot tea. Below, a quick method of prepping honey sticks at home, adapted from Instructables.

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

» Handful of clear plastic drinking straws (if using the flexible variety, trim the bendy end before you begin)

» One jar of honey

» Lighter (or heat sealer)

» Syringe

» Scissors

» Paper or cloth towels

WHAT TO DO

1. Thoroughly rinse your straws and syringe in hot water.

2. Insert the syringe into your jar of honey. Try using flavored, local, or organic honeys (mmmm: lavender). Inject the honey into the straw, leaving about half an inch of space at each end. It’s easiest to hold the straw horizontally to ensure that no air pockets form
during insertion. You can pinch and hold half an inch of the straw at each end to avoid
honey seepage.

3. Use the lighter to melt one end of the straw. Keep the straw level and balanced while heating—and please, for the love of all that is HOMEGROWN, be careful. Once melted, squeeze the straw end shut by pinching down hard. The straw can get very hot, so use caution when sealing and don’t let pint-size HOMEGROWN tykes try this alone. (Do we sound like your mom yet? Safety first!) Repeat on the opposite end of the straw.

4. Enjoy your honey sticks! Honey is nonperishable, so you can store it for long periods of time, including at room temp in the pantry. Storing sticks in the fridge will cause the honey to crystallize. If that happens, just leave the sticks out to thaw or soak them in a bowl of warm water to return them to their liquid state. Hooray, science!

SPEAK UP!
Have your own favorite honey flavor—or another HOMEGROWN use for straws? Post a comment below and keep the conversation rolling. You might also be interested in 101s on homemade extracts (think vanilla, peppermint, and almond), homemade chai tea concentrate, and elderberry syrup flu fighter, and you can always find more things to cook, preserve, plant, grow, make, craft, and melt in the HOMEGROWN 101 library.

PHOTOS: (MANY STICKS) PAMLINK, COURTESY OF CREATIVE COMMONS ON FLICKR; (WITH CANDY CORN) CAROLINE; (STICKS IN HAND) MRBULA, COURTESY OF CREATIVE COMMONS ON FLICKR