A Taste of Honey

I brought home the empty hive from the colony that died. Mice got in during the winter and did a lot of damage, and the colony never recovered. It's very sad, but the hive had three frames of capped honey in it. That's honey that is finished and the bees have covered the cells with a cap of beeswax to store it. So I thought I could extract that at home and get one or two jars of honey to use.

I de-capped the cells with a dessert spoon and strained the honey through a muslin-lined funnel. The golden clear honey ran into a dish. It smelled fantastic. I dipped my finger to taste it. The first taste was sweet and complex, delicious home-produced honey. And then another taste came through - the unmistakable taste of mouse pee. I had to drink a pint of orange juice to get the taste out of my mouth.