for the bees

 The early morning light creeps slowly over a green field in springtime, the bluish hue of dawn fading into gold as the sun awakens. In the hive, one among thousands stirs as the day breaks and invites her out once again, beckoning with the promise of a lovely and productive day. She stretches her wings and shakes out her body before heading out.

A field of clover is nearby, and it is here that she will work, flitting from cloverhead to cloverhead, collecting the food that will feed her queen and keep the babies thriving. Clover, she knows, will keep her strong for the weeks of work ahead, less susceptible to the illnesses that sometimes sweep through a hive. Clover, she knows, will make good honey.

Clover is also good for humans, although the honeybee doesn't realize this. Full of Vitamins A, B, C, and E, along with potassium and calcium (among others), both red and white clover can boost the nutritive value of a classic side salad tremendously. All of its parts, from the flower head to the roots, are edible, and can be used dried, fresh, or even cooked. Collect the leaves in the early spring to add to salads, serve steamed as a side dish, or even eat raw. Use the flower heads during the summer as an edible garnish, or add them dried to cookies and cakes for a unique sweet flavor and aroma. Both the leaves and the flowers can be steeped into a clover tea to help relieve coughs, colds, and even minor eye infections.

The honeybee hastens through the field, happy to do the work that will help provide for her hive. Then a nearby plant catches her attention, and without hesitation, she turns from the clover to collect the nectar from this new herb.

Tiny white flowers erupt from the thick green foliage of a basil plant. An herb renowned for its medicinal properties as well as its minty, peppery flavor, basil is also a favorite among bees of all kinds. Keep basil in your arsenal of medicinal herbs for its ability to reduce fevers; relieve the symptoms of colds, flus, and bronchitis; soothe sore joints and arthritis; and reduce swelling. The herb is even beneficial for cardiovascular health, and may be helpful in lowering cholesterol. Mixed with the strong, natural honey from local bees, its juice can help you naturally pass a kidney stone.

Moving from flower to flower, the honeybee notices that there are more flowering herbs nearby, all of which can benefit the honey and the hive. The puffy purple flowers of bee balm, the bluish-purple of sage, the pale pinkish-white of catnip, and the bright yellow of calendula peek out from the green around her. Of course, she can't see the colors, but she recognizes the plants and the nectar that will make fine honey for the winter. She doesn't mind that she will never get to enjoy the finished honey that she is working so hard to help make - she is only happy to know that the hive will benefit.

Beekeepers know that what you plant directly affects the flavor, quality, and consistency of the honey. The nectar of medicinal herbs can also produce medicinal quality honey. But even if you aren't a  beekeeper and will never get to taste the honey that the bees in your yard or garden make, there are other reasons to plant a few extra herbs in your garden this year. Bees of all kinds are needed to keep your plants producing. Allow them to flower just a bit - while tough pruning is necessary for a good yield, you may consider allowing one plant of each variety to go to flower to keep some bees in your yard. Even the clovers, dandelions, and wild mint that tend to plague lovers of a traditional green suburban lawn can actually improve your yard when they are allowed to flower, at least for a few days.

This bees' garden is just what our honeybee needed. The nectar from just a few of these flowers can do incredible things, working to keep the hive strong and healthy, help the queen produce more workers throughout the summer, and even protect the hive from invaders that might try to steal the honey.

The honeybee works tirelessly as the hot summer day progresses, gathering nectar and inadvertently spreading pollen along the way. The shadows finally start growing longer and longer, bringing her long day of work to an end. She flits to one last flower, then turns to head home with her sisters, all flying work-worn but content back to the hive. Tomorrow will be much the same but she doesn't mind - she is an herbalist and an artist, and nothing could delight her more than to spend her days nestled in flowers.

The Gluten Experiment

There are few things more comforting to me than baking bread. There is a certain warmth in the smell of the yeast, a half-remembered familiarity in the rhythmic kneading of the dough. I'm not sure if it's the amateur mathematician in me or if it's because of my OCD tendencies, but I love the predictable formula that makes every loaf of bread, from a simple white sandwich bread to a complex-tasting honey wheat or crusty French bread. Mix, knead, rise, shape, rise, bake.

It has been a long time since I baked bread on a regular basis. Two children make it difficult enough to find time for such olde world pleasures - and when you learn that one of them can't even eat the bread you make, it rather deflates the satisfaction that comes from the end result.

Mix. You will start with yeast, warm water, and sugar. Let these sit for about 10 minutes, then add in your fat, a touch of salt, and your flour. You can substitute honey for sugar, and use butter, margarine, shortening, or any number of oils (I prefer coconut) for your fat, but what really matters is the quality of your flour.

It happened a few months ago that I stumbled upon an article which described how so many people who were gluten intolerant in the the US were able to eat wheat in other countries. The main differing factor in American wheat? Nearly 80% of comercially available wheat in the US is harvested by being sprayed with Round Up, a well-known weed killer. The Round Up kills the entire field of wheat at about the same time, making harvesting easier and possibly slightly more efficient. Throughout the European Union, and in many other parts of the world, wheat treated with Round Up is illegal. Interestingly enough, America has the highest percentage of gluten intolerant residents in the world, with the numbers still rising, while countries that ban Round Up are seeing a much slower increase in the number of gluten intolerant residents. I should also point out that the US also allows the use of potassium bromate in its wheat, while the European Union bans that as well.

I did what any good crunchy stay-at-home mom with an affinity for bread-baking would do. I bought a bag of King Arthur's flour (which, although people online claim that it's European flour, states "made from select 100% American wheat" right on the bag. It is, however, unbleached and unbromated - check out King Arthur flour's commitment to non-GMO quality here.) - and I started making bread.

Knead. When you feel like working out those biceps, start kneading a "soft dough." When you want to work your triceps, too, look for a recipe that makes a "stiff dough." Kneading until you can actually feel the dough working against you (this is what they call "elastic") is extremely important. Overknead, and your dough will rise quickly. Underknead, and your dough will never quite rise properly and come out of the oven harder than you wanted it to.

Before I introduced the King Arthur's flour to my son's diet, I had to wait two weeks to make sure any trace gluten from another source wouldn't skew the results of my experiment. The rash around his mouth was completely gone and even the last of his remaining tongue sore had healed up by the time I fed him his first slice of King Arthur bread. He looked at me uncertainly when I offered it to him, at two years old already accepting of the fact that everybody else could eat bread but he couldn't. Then he opened his rosebud mouth, took a tiny little nibble, and beamed at a pleasure that he thought he would never again be allowed - Mama's homemade bread.

Rise. Although I always rise my bread in the bowl I used for mixing (which you're really not supposed to do), I still grease the bowl really well, and make sure to turn the dough over to grease the top. Then I pick the little bits of old dough out of my stick of butter, cover the dough with a dishtowel to keep the heat in the bowl, and go about my business while the well-kneaded dough ball rises. If you kneaded the dough well enough, it should be puffy and ready to shape in about an hour, maybe an hour and a half if you're making two loaves at once.

Over the next few weeks, King Arthur flour made its way into cakes, pies, muffins, cookies, quick bread, and even a batch of bagels, all of which I gave my gluten-intolerant son with growing confidence. And between homeschooling my four-year-old and nursing my newborn, I found time to work my biceps (and occasionally my triceps) and make bread.

Shape. Always push out the bubbles in your dough before you shape. When you roll out the dough then roll it up into a loaf shape, take care to get out as many bubbles as you can. The better option, I've found, is to knead them out.

Sometimes, as much as you want to, you just can't make bread that day, even though your husband needs bread for the sandwich that he'll take to work for lunch tomorrow. Sometimes, you just have to buy bread.

I realized somewhat belatedly that since wheat is not technically a genetically modified food, all I needed was the the little green USDA Organic seal to be sure that a loaf of bread had not been "treated" with Round Up or potassium bromate. Certified organic bread is hard to come by in Wal-Mart, but I found a loaf and tried it out. We ate the entire loaf in about three days, and my son still showed absolutely no reaction to the gluten.

Rise. The second time you let the loaves rise, you want to make sure you put them in the oven at just the right time. When the bread has definitely doubled in size and it feels like it's pushing back when you gently press a finger into the side, you know it's time to toss it in the oven. Any longer, and your bread could have the rather bizarre lingering taste and smell of yeast.

My son hadn't shown any symptoms of having gluten in his diet despite his nearly four weeks of eating bread almost every day. Unbelievably, his rash was still gone, his tongue clear, and he hadn't complained of his stomach hurting once. Just to make sure he hadn't somehow been miraculously cured of his condition, I gave a few non-King Arthur crackers to him and let him eat a piece of questionable wheat laden pizza. Like a post script in lemon juice that's been exposed to heat, a few rash bubbles appeared on his face shortly afterward and a sore spot spread across his tongue a few days later.

Bake. I had, for many years, a bad habit of pulling the bread out of the oven before it was quite ready. I was always afraid the crust would burn. Let your bread stay in the oven a little longer than it seems like it should. Nothing ruins a good loaf of bread like a slightly doughy center and a crust that's too thick.

About every three days, I have to make another loaf of bread. It's best with dinner on the the first night, on a sandwich for lunch the next, then as breakfast toast in the following days. My son eats it every day, with no symptoms, still. For him, bread is the food, not that made him abnormal in his family, but that made him normal again. For him, there will always be something soothing about the smell of freshly baked bread, the slightly springy texture that is the mark of a good loaf, the butter that gets on your fingers from the crust if you eat a slice before it has cooled. For me, well, there are few things more comforting than baking bread.