Tamarisk honey

Flavour and aroma

Aroma

malt, dry earth, molasses, faint salt

Flavour

mineral, malt, caramel, light salinity

Finish

Long, savoury and mineral.

Flavour character

• Warm and cooked — malty, molasses and treacle
• Earthy and mineral — mineral and saline

Colour, texture and crystallisation

Colour

1. Water white0–8 mm
2. Extra white8–17 mm
3. White17–34 mm
4. Extra light amber34–50 mm
5. Light amber50–85 mm
6. Amber85–114 mm — this honey
7. Dark amber114+ mm — this honey

Dark amber to brown.

Texture

Thick but pourable; Runny; Soft set

Crystallisation

Slow, step 2 of 5, from very slow to very fast

Slow — months before it starts to granulate; sets with a medium crystal.

Slow to set, consistent with a substantial honeydew component.

Typical composition

Moisture

14–18% (typically 16%)

Fructose

32–39% (typically 35%)

Glucose

26–33% (typically 29%)

pH

3.9–5 (typically 4.4)

Electrical conductivity

0.5–1.3 mS/cm (typically 0.8 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

Tamarix species on desert wadi, oasis margin and saline ground. The resource is a mixture of the shrub's own small flowers and honeydew from scale insects feeding on it.

Origins

Egypt, Sinai, Israel, Jordan, Iran, Central Asia and North Africa.

Origin pages

• Egypt
• Israel
• Iran

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

Typical harvest

May to August (northern hemisphere)

The scale insect season in the desert summer, with the shrub's own flowering contributing earlier.

A typical window for the honey type, HoneyHQ synthesis — not a calendar for any one place.

The bees

Bees work both the small flowers and the honeydew. Ants take a large share of the same resource, which is why the manna described in Exodus had to be gathered early in the morning.

Usual processing

Raw, Coarsely strained, Spun (centrifugally extracted), Cut comb

Tamarisk is planted extensively for windbreaks and dune stabilisation across the region, which has enlarged the resource considerably. In North America it is a serious invasive of riverine systems.

What to do with it

Its salinity and low sweetness make it a savoury honey. It works with cheese and on roast meat and is odd on toast.

At the tableWith cheeseGlazing and roastingMarinades

Pairings

• Salty sheep cheeses

  Salt on salt, with the malt bridging.

• Roast lamb

  Mineral honey on rich meat.

• Dates

  A desert pairing that works.

Similar honeys and substitutes

Three different questions with different answers: a honey that tastes alike can behave differently in a recipe, and the same set texture says nothing about flavour. Each list is chosen from the recorded fields that matter to its question — and, where tasting panels or specifications described both honeys, the terms they share — and every suggestion says which, and what will be different. Compare it side by side or build a tasting flight.

History and traditional use

The identification of tamarisk honeydew with biblical manna was proposed in the nineteenth century and investigated in detail in the 1920s and 1930s. It remains the leading naturalistic explanation, which is a different thing from being established.

• The sweet exudate of Sinai tamarisk has been gathered by Bedouin as mann and eaten, and is the most widely accepted natural explanation for the manna of Exodus.

Traditional use records that people have done something, and for how long. It is not evidence that it works.

Claims about this honey