Vegan Honey
Vegan honey recipe! Tastes like honey. Looks like honey. Smells like honey. Acts like honey. Buuuuut. It's not honey cuz it didn't come from bees. It's a painfully simple recipe using common ingredients. Plus you can store it indefinitely in your fridge because it won't crystallize like honey at cold temperatures. It's an all over win! Let the bees keep their hard work and food.
Servings - 2 Pints
Equipment
- Crock Pot
Ingredients
- 1 cup natural apple juice
- 3 cups water
- 2 bags dandelion tea
- 2 bags chamomile & rose tea
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
- 4 cups sugar
Instructions
- Pour the apple juice and water into a crock pot and add in the tea bags.
- Turn the crock pot up to high, cover, and let the tea bags steep for an hour.
- Remove the bags, stir in the sugar until it is fully dissolved, and leave the crock pot on high and partially covered overnight or for at least 8 hours. I generally place a wooden spoon across the top of the ceramic part of crock pot and prop the lid on that so that steam can escape but any splatters are contained.
- It will seem thin and runny at first but it will thicken as it cools. You can check it by taking a small spoonful and pouring it on a plate and putting it in the fridge. If it is thick and honeylike then it's done!
- This makes roughly 2 pints. Refrigerate or freeze.
Notes
Why the crock pot? Even on high heat you don't need to worry about scorching or boiling to hard crack stage. You dump it all in and leave it for 8-10 hours. You can make this "honey" on the stove top but you'll need to cook it over low heat and bring it to a slow bubble rather than constant bubble. If it hits 300 F it won't be a syrup anymore. Plus you need to worry about it burning if you can't dedicate time to stirring for an hour. So. Use a crock pot! Worried about the amount of sugar? Well. Guess what. Honey is sugar. So… don't stress it and just enjoy the bee free sweet goodness. Also, most store-bought honey is unregulated and many companies only use trace amounts of actual honey (or no honey) in their honey. The rest is high fructose corn syrup or a conglomeration of chemicals which mimic honey. At least with this recipe you know what's in it.