We buy honey by the gallon (what can I say, we make a lot of yogurt and granola) and store it in a bucket with a lid. I find a butter knife is the best way to extract it, thanks to its flat, scrapable surface. And yes, the crystallizing thing is a problem, especially without a microwave.

violet222 - what's your yogurt recipe?

I keep honey in the warmest part of my fridge...the butter keeper. I buy in bulk and decant into a wide mouth, two cup jar. I keep it cooled for more effective control using a teaspoon. Also, this method keeps me from swigging honey. When it crystalizes, I just sit the jar in med. hot water and it returns to it's original texture.

I use a smooth-sided wide-mouth glass jar and refill it with honey from the bulk section. I usually buy about 2 lbs at a time and it lasts us a while so I do occasionally deal with crystallization.

Thru trial and error, I now only employ two strategies and in tandem, they work wonderfully.

One is preventative, only impeccably clean, dry utensils are used to dip into the jar.

The other is dealing with crystallization, if it happens. I place the whole jar (w/o lid) in a saucepan with hot water over the lowest heat on the stovetop and I stir the honey until it is all liquid and smooth again without any sign of crystallization, careful not to let any water or steam get into the honey. The honey stays completely liquid for the rest of the time in the jar. I never have to do this more than once for 2 lbs of honey which is about a year's supply for us.

I had a glass jar with a screwtop lid of delicious honey my friend bought for me once...that didn't crystallize at all (though I did go through it rather quickly!).

I buy honey in a 1/2 gallon jar and decant it into half-pint canning jars when I bring it home. I top the jars with a little plastic wrap and then top with the lid. We use the small jars fairly quickly; since we started doing this we haven't had any crystallize, we always did before we could use up the 1/2 gallon when we left it in the big jar or put it into a plastic squeeze bottle. I think the glass appears to work better than plastic; also we only opened the big jar once and leave the small jars closed until we use them; less air into the honey jars.

Caution here, honey heats really fast in the microwave. The molecules are quite polar and very efficiently capture the microwave energy.

Also, those plastic squeeze things, especially the bears, are prone to overheat and distort in the microwave. I had one bear turn into a zombie from overheating.

When heating in the microwave try less than full power and 30 seconds on, rest for a couple of minutes, and so on...

Caution: heating plastic could cause harmful BPAs to leach into the honey. I like the glass jar ideas.

My dad is a beekeeper, so I have some experience with honey. If your honey crystallizes, it's a good thing. That means the processing of the honey was not done at a high heat which would reduce crystals. My dad waits for a sunny day and puts the honey in in the sun. Think sun tea.

Since crystallization happens over a fairly long time, i.e. months, I always buy honey in the smallest bottle possible. It never lasts me long enough for to have to worry about crystallization.

Honey is comprised of to main components: Fructose and Glucose (among the thousands of other little micro-whatnots that make honey so miraculous). So when you have a honey made of mostly sucrose, it will remain syrupy for a long long time. For example: Acacia honey are nearly entirely sucrose, and it never crystallizes. On the other hand, Lavender honey is mostly glucose, it crystallizes within hours of being extracted from the hive, into a luscious, frosting like consistency. And then there's everything in between.

KittyAtlanta: There's no need to keep your honey in the fridge, honey is an anaerobic environment, so it will last indefinitely. Jars of hundred year old honey have been discovered completely edible, albeit crystallized ;) Cool air actually speeds up crystallization.

Which brings me to the my final point, which is about the debate of pasteurizing vs. not pasteurizing honey. Pasteurizing honey is an attempt to kill off anything bad in the honey, but also to keep the honey from crystallizing. Pasteurizing not only kills the flavor of unique mono-floral hones, but it also destroys all the antibiotic properties that strengthen your immune system. Did you know that a rare honey from New Zeeland has proven more affective at warding off flesh eating bacteria than antibiotics?

Moral of the story: eat raw honey. Lots of it!

Sweatergirl, interesting to hear about the fructose/glucose thing. I had always just thought honey only crystallises if it gets too cold, no matter what kind it is.

Everybody, please note the point about pasteurisation destroying honey's antibacterial properties! I often read 'tips' (likely they've been linked to on this very site) that off-handedly claim you can use honey on burns, cuts and scrapes. But this only applies if you use non-pasteurised, which basically invalidates any normal supermarket honey. Even most organic honeys are pasteurised.

And that rare honey from New Zealand (not Zeeland) is manuka honey, which is honey from the blossoms of the manuka tree. It's not actually rare, just a monofloral honey like any other. It can be REALLY expensive (like AU$25 for 500g/1lb), I think because producers realised they could charge premium for it because of its super-duper antibac properties. But I've found a producer here in Melbourne that makes Australian manuka honey (the plant is native to S/E Oz as well) for the same price as ordinary honey, and I can buy it by the kilo.

I reiterate your moral to the story, Sweatergirl! Honey is something you should be willing to pay a bit more for to get unpasteurised and quality.

PS: If any Aussie readers live in Melbourne and want to get this awesome honey, let me know and I'll tell you where!

Tupolo honey does not crystallize fyi. Since I don't use a lot of honey I always buy Tupolo, I've kept some bottles for years in my pantry and never had a problem with it. It cost slightly more than the typical wildflower honey, but for me its worth it.

I actually ~like~ when my honey crystallizes. Makes it less messy to spoon into my cup of tea, and then it just melts as I stir it in. Using it in recipes, though, I can see where you'd want nice, liquid honey.

In addition to the properties of honey that have already been mentioned, it's also hydroscopic, meaning that it absorbs water readily, like via environmental humidity Keeping the container airtight as much as possible seems to help prevent water absorption and thus, crystalization.

I also want to cheer the health benefits of honey. I can't speak about flesh eating bacteria, but I know that eating local, unpasturized honey has solved my seasonal allergy issues just about 100% and I can't remember the last time I've had a cold or been sick. It's one of my miracle foods, along with plain organic yogurt. I eat both almost every day.

p.s. to the poster that wanted a yogurt recipe, look online. There is no "recipe" just directions, basically: choose your milk, heat, cool, innoculate with a spoonful of yogurt and incubate.

Sweatergirl, thanks for the refrigeration info. I keep it in the fridge so I can control portion size. It's easier to do that when the honey is cold. I'm with ya on the raw honey preference. My favorite is Tupelo.

Pixie, I googled to find a similar recipe, and came up with this: http://www.healthy-green-lifestyle.com/making-homemade-yogurt.html

I do two quarts at a time, and sterilize the jars with boiling water that I pour over them (I don't have a dishwasher). I inoculate (using plain Greek yogurt for best taste) when the milk has cooled to between 100 and 120 degrees. I add a few tablespoons of dried milk with the inoculant to make it thick. I don't use an oven to incubate, I use a small cooler with hot tap water (around 130 degrees), it seems to get more consistent results. If I make a batch after dinner, the yogurt is ready when I get up in the AM.

Sounds like a lot to think about, but after a few batches, it's like second nature. And it makes organic yogurt much mroe affordable.

Good luck!

thanks violet222!

NO! NO! NO! Do not microwave your honey. It destroys the beneficial properties. Set the jar in warm water or in the sun, stir occasionally as the crystals desolve. We've heard about the positive effects on allergies of eating local honey. I confess we are both showing fewer symptoms this summer. My husband is a beekeeper and we are always learning.