A month ago when we were anxiously stalking Bob Kress for our first ever honey bees, Bob the Bee Man, as I like to call him, was busy as a – oh, I can’t say it. No, I won’t say it. But he was busy.
“Sorry I haven’t checked about your bees yet,” Bob had said. “I’ve been moving bees out of blueberries all weekend from morning to night, and I’ll be spending the next couple of days moving them into chestnuts.”
His words said, “I’m busy.”
His always gentle tone said, “I love my work.”
And the vision I created from the two was my idea of a perfect day – a snapshot of this seemingly idyllic rural life that I’ve been craving for months that are slowly turning into years. Alas, while I was stuck underground on a Blue line train with an equipment problem, Bob was shuttling his bees from one field to another. I was so overcome by the vision, I didn’t consider the obvious question – What does blueberry honey taste like?
On Saturday I got the answer to the question I never thought to ask. I swung by Kress Apiary’s stall at the Division Street Farmer’s Market. I didn’t plan to buy honey – we were hoping to stretch our last bottle until we could harvest our own. Instead, I planned to buy some fresh eggs layed by the same chickens that had greeted us on our first trip to Burns Harbor, Indiana and give Bob’s wife Darlene an update on our babies bees.
Beau Knows Honey
When I approached the stall there was a small crowd around the honey section. (In addition to honey, eggs, and bee pollen, Kress Apiary sells handmade soaps, lip balms and other products made from honey and beeswax.) As luck would have it one of Darlene’s sales assistants was hosting a honey tasting. And the star of the show? Blueberry blossom honey! Momentarily forgetting our bees and eggs and cruising past Darlene with a quick wave, I raced to the honey table and shimmied my way up to the front. Our gracious tasting host Beau immediately handed me a tiny straw dripping with honey. A professional saxophonist with a contagious affection for the green city markets, Beau knows his honey. I put the straw to my mouth and closed my eyes as the warm honey hit my tongue.
Now you know those people that can discern the taste of black currant and spice in a glass of zinfandel? Well, I’m not one of them, though I have been known to drink a few glasses just trying. So to say I detected overtones of blueberries or hints of anything that I could accurately describe would be a stretch. What I can say is that honey tasted like no other honey I’ve had before, and it was divine.
Thirteen dollars later, I was on my way with a pound of blueberry blossom honey and two dozen eggs. What a tasty start to the weekend! I strolled, okay, I staggered back to the car with my overloaded market basket – a veritable cornucopia of local flavors. In addition to the eggs and honey, it was bursting with kohlrabi the size of baseballs, the season’s last asparagus and strawberries, and two pounds of lamb sausage from Mint Creek Farm.
While I continue to dream of a life more rural, I am grateful to live in a city where the farms can get to me, when I can’t get to the farms.
You can also find Kress Apiary at the Federal Plaza Market on Tuesdays and the Daley Plaza Market on Thursdays.
