Phacelia honey

Flavour and aroma

Aroma

light blossom, fresh herb, clean wax

Flavour

gentle floral, clean sweetness, a faint green note

Finish

Short and clean.

Intensity

Mild

Sweetness

Very sweet

Bitterness

None

Acidity

Low

Colour, texture and crystallisation

Colour

Water white (0-8 mm Pfund)toExtra white (8-17 mm Pfund)toWhite (17-34 mm Pfund)

Very pale, occasionally with a faint blue-grey cast in bulk that disappears in a small jar.

On setting: Sets to a fine white cream.

Texture

Runny; Soft set; Creamed

Crystallisation

Moderate — granulates over a few months

Granulates over two to four months with fine crystals, and is frequently sold soft-set.

Typical composition

Moisture

15–18.5% (typically 16.8%)

Fructose

37–42% (typically 39.5%)

Glucose

31–36% (typically 33.5%)

Glucose-to-fructose ratio

0.78–0.94 (typically 0.85)

pH

3.6–4.4 (typically 4)

Electrical conductivity

0.1–0.35 mS/cm (typically 0.2 mS/cm)

These are typical ranges assembled across published work, not measurements of a specific honey.

What these mean: the sugars and the ratio · moisture · conductivity · how each is measured

Where it comes from

Floral source

Phacelia tanacetifolia. Grown as a cover crop, green manure and pollinator strip rather than for any harvest of its own, which makes the honey a by-product of soil management.

Origins

Germany, Poland, France, Britain, Hungary and Ukraine, following agri-environment scheme acreage. Also grown in its native California for seed.

Origin pages

• Germany
• Poland
• Great Hungarian Plain
• Ukraine

Resolved from both directions — origins this honey names, and origins that name it.

Harvest

June to October (northern hemisphere)

Governed by sowing date rather than by season — six to eight weeks from sowing to flower, then six to eight weeks of flowering. Successional sowing produces a flow from June to the first frosts.

The bees

Exceptionally productive and exceptionally democratic. The uncoiling flower head opens florets in succession over weeks, and the accessible nectar is worked by honey bees, bumblebees, solitary bees and hoverflies simultaneously — which is why it appears in nearly every European pollinator seed mix.

Usual processing

Spun (centrifugally extracted), Coarsely strained, Creamed (seeded and controlled-set), Filtered

What to do with it

A general-purpose honey of genuine quality. Mild enough for tea, smooth enough to spread, cheap enough to cook with where it is produced.

At the tableSpreadingIn hot drinksBakingDressingsDesserts

Pairings

• Toast and butter

  Smooth-setting and unobtrusive — the everyday job done well.

• Yoghurt and fruit

  Adds sweetness and nothing that would compete with the fruit.

• Herbal infusions

  Mild enough not to erase a delicate tea.

History and traditional use

Phacelia honey barely existed in Europe before the late twentieth century. Its arrival tracks agri-environment policy directly: as schemes began paying for pollinator strips and cover crops from the 1990s, a Californian annual became a European honey source, and the volume rises and falls with the subsidy rules.