Honey Pumpkin Log

The holidays are all about cozy flavors, warm kitchens, and a little extra sweetness — and this honey pumpkin log checks all the boxes. It’s festive, beautiful on a dessert table, and has just the right balance of spice and natural sweetness thanks to a swirl of honey in the batter. If you’re looking for a dessert that feels like the holidays but still keeps it real with simple, wholesome ingredients, this one’s for you.

Honey Pumpkin Log 

Cake Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

• 1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 3 large eggs

• 1/2 cup raw honey

• 2/3 cup pumpkin purée (not pumpkin pie filling)

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling:

• 8 oz cream cheese, softened

• 1/4 cup honey

• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a 10x15 jelly roll pan with parchment and lightly grease.

2. In one bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices, and salt.

3. In another bowl, beat eggs, honey, pumpkin, and vanilla until smooth. Add dry ingredients and stir until just combined.

4. Pour batter into pan, spread evenly, and bake for 13–15 minutes, until the top springs back when touched.

5. Immediately turn cake onto a clean towel dusted with powdered sugar. Peel off parchment, then roll the cake (with the towel inside) starting from the short end. Let it cool completely.

6. Mix filling ingredients until smooth. Once the cake is cool, unroll, spread filling, and gently roll back up (without the towel this time).

7. Chill at least 1 hour before slicing. Dust with powdered sugar before serving if you’re feeling fancy.

This honey pumpkin log is soft, spiced, and naturally sweet — perfect with a hot drink and some twinkle lights. It’s festive without being fussy, and the honey gives it that little golden glow that just feels like holiday magic.

Recipe and Photo Credit to the National Honey Board

Keeping Warm with Honey and Gift-Giving Ideas

As the holidays come closer, the temperatures start to drop! Luckily, there are wonderful drinks that you can enjoy while staying warm, and enjoying honey this fall and winter season.

Honey Lemon Tea: Mix warm water (not boiling), a spoonful of honey, and a splash of lemon juice. It’s cozy, soothing, and great for your throat, especially if you catch a cold!

Honey Hot Cocoa: Hot chocolate is a fun holiday drink to enjoy. Instead of adding sugar, try a tablespoon of honey to remind you of the springtime that will come back around soon with its smooth sweetness!

Spiced Honey Milk: Sweetness (from honey), spice, and everything nice! Warm up some milk and add honey with a sprinkle of cinnamon or nutmeg. 

Also, if you are wondering what gift you should get your favorite family member, school teacher, or friend… give them a bottle or jar of honey so they can also try these recipes, and enjoy honey in their cooking or baking! 

Their Power, Our Dinner Plate

It’s easy to overlook the quiet work happening behind the scenes in nature, but pollinators are doing big things for our food supply every single day. From almonds to apples to that avocado toast you love, much of what we eat starts with a honeybee doing its thing.

So, What Foods Come from Pollination?

A lot of common foods  rely on pollinators:

• Fruits: apples, blueberries, strawberries, watermelon, cherries, peaches

• Veggies: cucumbers, pumpkins, squash, peppers

• Nuts: almonds (they're 100% bee-pollinated!)

• Coffee, chocolate, and even vanilla get help from pollinators, too

How Much Do Pollinators Really Matter?

A lot — like, billions of dollars a lot. Around 75% of global food crops depend at least in part on pollination. In the U.S. alone, pollination contributes $20+ billion annually to agriculture. Without bees, we'd still have some grains and root veggies, but the variety and nutrition in our diets would seriously suffer.

Next time you grab a piece of fruit or drizzle honey into your tea, give a quiet shoutout to the bees. They’re tiny, but their impact is massive — and our plates (and grocery stores) are way more colorful because of them.

Photo Credit to Genetic Literacy Project

 

All About Honey: How Is it Made?

Happy National Honey Month! 

Have you seen honey in your local grocery store? The farmer’s market? Your own kitchen at home? Have you ever tasted honey on toast or in tea? You may know that honeybees make it…but how?

When bees visit flowers, they drink a sweet syrup called nectar using their straw-like tongue called a proboscis and carry it back to their hive in their honey stomach. There, they exchange the nectar with other bees in the hive using their proboscis, which they insert into their honeycomb cells. The bees flap their wings at 11,700 times per minute to dry it out (dehydration), and then allow the nectar to mature into thick, sweet honey! Once it’s ready, they seal it up with wax to keep it fresh. Like adding a lid to their very own honey jar! 

Not all honey is the same. It can look and taste different depending on the flowers the bees visit. Orange blossom honey is light and fruity, while buckwheat honey is dark and bold. Some honey is runny, and some is thick like buttery fondant! There is a honey for everybody!

Want to try honey for yourself? Visit a farmers' market in your town with your family or friends and taste different kinds made by local honeybees. You can also try cooking with honey at home using the recipes from our blog, drizzle it on toast, stir it into yogurt, or sweeten tea with a spoonful.

Next time you enjoy honey, make sure to thank the busy bees who made it!

Have No Fear When Bees are Near

Bee stings are never fun, but they may happen! The good news? They're usually harmless and easy to treat, especially if you know what to do right away. Whether you got a little too close to a curious honeybee or stumbled into their flight path, here’s how to handle the sting and a little insight into how bee venom is actually used in healing. 

How to Remove a Bee Stinger

If you’ve been stung by a bee act fast:

1. Look for the stinger. It’ll look like a tiny black splinter.
2. Scrape, don’t pinch. Use the edge of a credit card or fingernail to gently scrape the stinger out. Avoid using tweezers — pinching can squeeze more venom in.
3. Clean the area with soap and water, and apply a cold compress to reduce swelling.

Wait, Bee Venom Can Be Healing?

The answer is yes, with Apitherapy! The use of bee products (like honey, propolis, royal jelly, and even venom) in natural healing. Bee venom therapy is actually used in some wellness circles to treat inflammation, arthritis, and even chronic pain. So yes, bee stings hurt — but knowing how to handle them quickly makes all the difference.

Photo Credit to Bee Culture

Honeybees Waggle Dance and Help Make Our Food

Did you know that honeybees can dance? But they don’t dance just for fun; they dance to share important information with the other bees in their hive. This special bee dance is called the waggle dance, and it helps honeybees communicate about the floral sources they find. When bees visit flowers, they also help plants grow through something called pollination.

When a honeybee finds a flower full of sweet nectar or pollen, she flies back to the hive to tell her sisters. Instead of talking, she dances! The waggle dance is a special kind of bee behavior where the bee wiggles her body while moving in a figure-eight shape. The direction, angle to the sun, and the intensity of her vibrations that she dances tell the other bees which way to fly, and the speed of her wiggle shows how far the flowers are. 

Why do bees need flowers, and why do flowers need bees? Flowers give bees nectar and pollen. Nectar is a sweet liquid syrup that bees drink and then turn into honey, and pollen is a yellow powdery substance that bees use for protein. When bees collect pollen, they also drop some of it from flower to flower, which helps the plant reproduce. This is called pollination. Pollination helps flowers grow seeds, and seeds grow into fruits and vegetables. Without bees, we wouldn’t have many of the foods we eat, like apples, blueberries, cucumbers, and pumpkins.

Their waggle dance helps the hive find the best flowers for the honeybee colony, and their visits to flowers help plants grow and make our food. So the next time you see a bee buzzing by, remember she might be dancing soon to tell her friends about the tasty flowers she found! Try planting bee-friendly flowers like lavender and sunflowers in your garden.

The Honey Hydrator

When the weather heats up, staying hydrated becomes non-negotiable, especially if you're spending time outside or sweating it out at the gym. You don’t need anything fancy to feel refreshed. This two-ingredient honey hydrator is light, natural, and gives you just enough of a boost when you need it most.

Honey Hydrator Recipe
    Ingredients:

• 12 oz cold water (bonus points if it’s filtered)

• 1 teaspoon honey

    Instructions:

1. Stir the honey into the water until fully dissolved.
2. Pour over ice or keep it chilled in your water bottle.
3. Sip + enjoy the subtle sweetness and light energy lift.

That’s it, fast hydration and a natural hit of energy when you're on the go. I love this before a workout, mid-hike, or even just running errands in the heat. A quick hydrator, with some natural antioxidants, and a sweet taste!