This is a post in the 6 Categories of Herbal Remedies series. To read the previous post, go here.
To start from the beginning of the series, go here.
Honey might be a sometimes overlooked remedy style, but it’s a delicious one with additional benefits from the honey itself. While not accessible to everyone–real raw honey is both expensive and hard to find in food deserts–honey can add a medicinal sweetness to many preparations. Honey is also a natural preservative, so these remedies will last.
Honey itself has several medicinal properties1: it is antimicrobial and antibacterial, helps accelerate wound healing (including ulcers, burns, and infected wounds), and is anti-inflammatory and antioxidant. Manuka honey is ideal for our medicines, though it is pricey. Other honeys are also good, provided they are pure honey and not diluted with corn syrup.
Honey’s medicinal properties have even led to the development of a sterile honey–“medihoney”–for use in hospitals against drug-resistant bacteria.
There’s a ongoing debate in herbal circles about whether or not you should heat up honey, and if you do heat up honey, to what temperature. Some herbalists swear that you shouldn’t heat honey over 120*F; other traditions have the honey heated to just under boiling. The honey heating question is more than we can cover here today, but if you want to hear more about this to reach your own conclusions, drop me a comment to let me know!
Honey
Herbal honeys are simple to make and delicious to eat, and the sweetness can help make certain herbs more palatable. Honey will absorb all the volatile oils and water-soluble components in the herb because honey is hydroscopic–this means it collects water.
It also means that if you use fresh herbs, they’ll crystalize with sugars from the honey! So making ginger honey also makes candied ginger–how cool is that! But if you don’t have fresh herbs, don’t worry–you can make herbal honeys with dried herbs too.
To make herbal honey: put your herb(s) of choice into a wide-mouthed jar (if the herbs are fresh, chop them up first), and then pour in enough honey to cover all of the plant matter. Depending on how thick your honey is, you might need to use a spoon or chopstick or similar kitchen implement to help get the honey all the way through the herbs. Cover, label, and ignore for up to six weeks. Then your honey is ready! You don’t even need to remove the herbs if you don’t want to. An herbal honey will last functionally forever; honey doesn’t go bad.
Syrup
Elderberry syrup is probably one of the most famous herbal syrups, but you can make syrups out of more than just elderberries. Syrups, like most of the preparations covered in this section, are a great way to make less delicious herbs more palatable or simply more appealing in general. They’ll last in the fridge for easily a month, or you can add an alcohol like brandy or even tinctures, which will help preserve it.
To make herbal syrup: start with a concentrated decoction (using 4 parts water to 1 part herb and cook until it’s evaporated down to 2 parts). Strain out the herb and return the decoction to the pot on the stove, heating gently as you stir in your honey until dissolved–use 1 part honey for every 2 parts of decoction. If you want to add alcohol, add around 1/4 cup for every 1 cup of syrup.
Elixir
An elixir is a tincture plus a sweetener, like honey. (Maple syrup or molasses would also work!) Again, this is a good strategy to help deal with the strong taste of some herbs, but I also like the touch of sweetness for blends meant for grief or periods of high stress, when we naturally crave a little more sweetness in our lives.
I tend to mix in my honey after I’ve made the tincture, but you could also decide to add the honey to the beginning of the tincture process. In that case, you’ll want to go with either equal parts alcohol and honey, or 1 part honey 3 parts alcohol (1:3 ratio).
To make elixirs: fill a jar 2/3s of the way with your herb, then fill half the jar with honey, and the remaining half with alcohol. (Alternatively, fill a 1/3 of the jar with honey, and the rest with alcohol.) Cover, label, and let sit for four weeks, then strain out the herb. You could also add honey to a tincture after the fact.
Oxymel
If elixirs are tinctures plus sweetener, then oxymels are vinegars plus sweetener. Your favorite fire cider? Yup, you can add honey to that. Digestive bitters made as oxymels can also help the medicine go down for people sensitive to the bitterness, but remember that the bitterness is the medicine, so don’t completely drown it out with sweet.
Like with elixirs, you can add honey to a vinegar afterwards to make an oxymel, or infuse them together.
To make oxymels: fill a jar 2/3s of the way with your herb, then fill a 1/3 of the jar with honey, and the rest with vinegar. (You want a 2:1 ratio, vinegar to honey.) Cover, label, and let sit for four weeks, then strain out the herb.
Pastes
Pastes are a great way to preserve the potency of herbs for a long time and often seem like a treat to take. They’re also incredibly easy to make!
To make honey pastes: stir powdered herbs into warmed honey at a 1:5 ratio (1 part powdered herb for 5 parts honey–replace ‘part’ with your measurement of choice). Stir for 15 minutes, longer than you’ll think you need to, which will help it not clump when it cools. Pour into a jar, label, and seal.
Lozenges
Related to pastes, you can make herbal lozenges–think homemade cough drops! They’ll keep for 6 months to a year in a tightly sealed container.
To make herbal lozenges: mix enough powdered herb into your honey until it’s too thick to stir and looks more like dough. Then pinch off pieces and roll them into little balls no bigger than the last digit of your index finger, and roll them in additional powdered herb until they’re coated. (This prevents them from sticking to each other and everything else under the sun.)
Sweet sweet honey, sweet sweet herbal medicine. Which honey-based preparation is your favorite?
This is the fifth post in the 6 Categories of Herbal Remedies series.
1 Mandal MD, Mandal S. Honey: its medicinal property and antibacterial activity. Asian Pac J Trop Biomed. 2011 Apr;1(2):154-60. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3609166/