Twin Spruce Apiaries

Honey isn’t just honey and beekeepers need to love their bees. Walter Bauer is a second generation apiarist and he makes a honey of a honey. He is my go-​to guy for a five lb. jar or buckwheat honey twice a year. It is great, which means it’s dark in flavor, dark in appearance, needs to be tasted to be appreciated. They sell a selection of their own variety honeys such as bamboo, basswood and clover — these being made from the honey in hives set in fields of those flowering plants — as well as delicious wildflower honeys.
Buckwheat honey might be an a taste worth acquiring, if you’ve never had it. It’s not easy to describe. The flavor is strong and dark as the honey — there’s a hint of wood, a tiny bit of mint, but mostly it has a clean yet earthy flavor.
He doesn’t cook his honey, which means in its raw form it will crystallize. I take this minor inconvenience as a sign of quality, and gently warm the crystallized honey in a bath of hot but not too hot water (I don’t want to cook it) to turn it back into a liquid.
He cares for his bees, always leaving enough honey in the hives for them to winter over on their own production (Most industrial beekeepers take all the honey and use high-​glucose corn syrup for the bees to winter on.) He is dealing with colony collapse disorder as most beekeepers are.
His honey prices are fine: $ 22.00 for 5lbs of buckwheat was sweet!

Twin Spruce Apiaries sells their own raw honey, which is gathered from the Catskills. They have a booth, on Saturdays, in the Farmer’s Market in Union Square. While I do enjoy their bamboo, and basswood honeys, the real winner is their wildflower blend It’s probably the best I’ve tasted, which is ironic for me because I hate blended anything. I usually like straight stuff. It has a very mellow taste with a very notable flowery, petal like aftertaste finish. Just exquisite.