Our Rare Hawaiian Organic White Honey is known for its creamy texture and subtle flavor-but our Silk Honey is the crème de la crème-literally, it is our creamiest, smoothest, silkiest texture honey. We first introduced Silk Honey in 2007 and it immediately became a NASFT (North American Specialty Food Trade Association) Sofi Silver finalist for best new product!


Silk Honey is from the same nectar (kiawe) as our White Honey, but we refined how we finish the honey to create an even smoother texture. Many people ask why our honey is white and looks whipped (it is not!). The creamy white texture is a result of the fine crystallization of the honey (which is characteristic of kiawe honey) when harvesting is timed correctly. If you do a careful taste test (eyes closed!), you can detect the very fine crystals in our White Honey. If you repeat the test with our Silk Honey, you will not be able to feel any of the tiny crystals, which is why the texture is so smooth and silky. It takes a lot of meticulous attention to detail to make a natural and unheated honey as smooth as our Silk Honey, but we thrive on challenge.


Crystals are ubiquitous in our lives: diamonds, snow, sugar, salt, ice, etc; and they are the basis for much of the high tech world in which we live. A computer chip is made of crystals (silicon crystals); our honey is composed of crystals (sugar crystals). Here at our honey farm, the low tech world of nature and our meticulous beekeepers combine to offer a live, natural food composed of tiny, edible crystals. While silicon crystals deliver you high tech information, the fine crystals in our honey deliver you ‘A Taste of the Magic of Hawaii’ – delicious, delicate honey crystals imbued with the essence of the Hawaii sun and flowers.


Many of you asked about shelf life of our honey. Our Silk Honey has a longer shelf life than our other honeys. We recommend that it be used within six months to preserve its gourmet quality and texture. If stored in the refrigerator, its original characteristics will be preserved up to 18 months.


Because we do not heat our honey, the naturally occurring enzymes remain alive and active. Over time (4-6 months) the action of the enzymes will change the honey’s texture, flavor and color. That’s why it is important to store our honey in a cool dry environment to slow down the enzymatic activities. Refrigeration or freezing is a good way to store our honey for an extended period of time. If eaten within 4-6 months, depending on the texture that you prefer, there is no need to refrigerate. While honey does change over time, it is edible indefinitely. Two thousand year old edible honey was found in the pyramids in Egypt.


Our Silk Honey is very popular among honey fans and connoisseurs. We make Silk Honey in small batches and we only have about a 6 week supply left. To experience our smooth as silk honey, you can order your honey now!

Lilikoi is passion fruit in Hawaiian.


Lilikoi is a fragrant fruit with a lovely tangy and sweet taste. Many people think that the beeLilikoi Honeys feed on the nectar of the lilikoi flower and that is how we get lilikoi honey. But in fact, we mix pure wild-crafted puree of the lilikoi fruit into our Organic White Honey to make our Rare Hawaiian Organic White Honey with Hawaiian Lilikoi. The sweetness of our white honey mixes perfectly with the tartness of the lilikoi. (Kind of like some couples, eh?)


Passion fruit (Passiflora edulis) is native to South America, and grows prolifically in Hawaii. It is a rich source of vitamin C and a good source of vitamin A, iron, and potassium. We source our lilikoi puree locally from a small environmentally aware company.


Ways to Use Lilikoi Honey

If you’re like us – we like eating all of our honeys straight out of the jar! It is also a great spread on pancakes, waffles or whole wheat toast. You can also combine the lilikoi honey with butter or cream cheese as a spread. Sunee Campbell, our Production Manager uses our lilikoi honey to make an easy and delicious cake frosting. Its great on carrot cake and chocolate cake! Just whip one 8 oz block of cream cheese with about 3 Tablespoons of lilikoi honey.


Try our Silk and Passion Gift Box or a jar of our Rare Hawaiian Organic White Honey with Hawaiian Lillikoi.

Check out our February Newsletter!

Last week at Volcano Island Honey Co., Dr. Steven Martin of the University of Sheffield (UK) visited our farm for the second time to collect samples for his research on insect viruses. We took advantage of Dr. Martin’s visit to learn more about the latest in bee health worldwide – a subject that affects us all, since many of our favorite food crops rely on bees for pollination (including avocados, lemons, apples and broccoli). As one of the world’s foremost scientists studying honeybee viruses, we thought you might be interested in hearing what Dr. Martin had to say – especially as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has recently received much media attention.

CCD is characterized by a sudden departure of worker bees from a hive still rich in resources and brood. The title of a recent New York Times article, “Scientists and soldiers solve a bee mystery,” was somewhat misleading, as the CCD quandary remains largely unresolved. One recently published study and the basis for the NYT article suggested that CCD might be linked to the combined presence of fungus and virus in the hive. Yet, many scholars are exploring other possible culprits – such as yet unknown viruses, GMOs, and pesticides applied to crops consumed by bees. Of particular concern to some beekeepers, neonicotinoids, or nicotine-based insecticides, are known to be harmful to bees and have already been partially banned in France.

Luckily for us, CCD has not reached Hawaii. Nonetheless, other bee diseases are threatening our hives, as well as many others around the state. These include the Varroa mite, responsible for spreading the viruses Dr. Martin studies. According to Dr. Martin the mites themselves are less harmful than the viruses they carry. The viruses enter the brood and adult bees at the mites puncture wound/feeding site on the bees body; these viruses proliferate exponentially and reduce the bees’ lifespan by about two thirds. On Dr. Martin’s first visit to Volcano Island Honey a year ago Varroa had not yet infested our colonies; on this return visit he intends to compare the virus levels present in newly varroa-infested colonies with the levels he found in those same colonies before they were infested with varroa.

Over the past few decades, Varroa has managed to spread across the world at an alarming rate: the first mite was found on the east coast of the U.S. in 1979 and reached Hawai’i in 2007 (the Big Island in 2008). As we understood from Dr. Martin, this epidemic is related to humans moving infested mite-resistant Asian bees into regions where non-resistant European honeybees lived, allowing the mite to crossover and infest the European honeybees. In this way, human meddling with nature has probably contributed to an environmental problem, threatening not only bees, but beekeepers and honey lovers – as well as some 30% of our entire food supply.

We are now working with Dr. Martin and researchers at the University of Hawaii at Manoa to fight the Varroa mite so that our bees can continue to live long healthy lives and create the very special honey we love sharing with you. Dr. Martin’s fascinating visit also renewed our commitment to holistic, organic honey production – as pure and natural as possible, for your health and that of our planet.

In considering the topics for this year’s newsletter, a staff member told me that our newsletter was lacking our typical sparkle, and that we report basically the same story every year. “People came, people left. Honey harvest is up, honey harvest is down. Bees are in trouble due to the latest threat.” So this year I thought I would leave those stories to our Blog and Facebook and share with you the deeper successes of this little business.


As an eclectic spiritual practitioner I know that the wheel of the world keeps turning – good/bad, down/up, rich/poor, sickness/health – and that it is part of my task to transcend this whirl – to be a part of it all, but not to become overly attached to it – to recognize that my essential being is only temporarily visiting in this body.


It is essential that I incorporate my up/down/spin-around busyness as part of my spiritual practice. Since running a small business is what Candice and I spend most of our time doing, it is important to recognize it as part of our spiritual practice. And what is our spiritual practice? To be awake as much as possible and to do good and at the very least to do no harm to the environment and living beings.


So then, what is this business about? Is it about money? Well, money is part of it. Money enables us to keep going as a business and share this exceptional honey with you. Without a profitable business we wouldn’t have the opportunity to connect in meaningful ways with all of the people who flow through Volcano Island Honey as staff, as customers, as chefs, as friends – all helping make it such a special place to be. And the business is also a vehicle for expressing our intention to be an example of the possibility of working and living in harmony with the earth, with people and with spirit and at the same time be financially successful.


The other day I was on the phone with the CEO of a large company that sells our honey. He was sharing with me the many life changes he has been experiencing since he had heart trouble earlier this year changes that made obvious the impermanence of all material things. Then he said, “You know five mornings a week I get up and have a dab of your honey on my toast and in my tea. Your honey connects me to the peaceful tranquility of Hawaii.” He reminded me of the subtle reach of our humble work – to know that a busy and important executive like this is touched each day by our intention and our desire to share a Taste of the Magic of Hawaii.


For 25 years we have been getting letters from customers telling us that our honey is a special part of their day. The fact that we can facilitate the transmission of our deep intention embodied in this delightful honey, and that so many appreciate it so much, is truly satisfying. That is what this business is really about.


May this Holiday Season bring peace in your heart, in your family and in the world.


Aloha,


Richard


Richard Spiegel and Ohana (Family) ~ Beekeepers & Gatherers of Fine Honey


Click here for this year’s Holiday Specials.

Richard was recently in California visiting his daughter and her family. What started out as an idea to talk to his grandson Hayden’s class evolved into a presentation to the entire 1st grade (about 100 children) at Lilac School in Valley Center, California.


In teaching about the parts of a bee Richard asked who had been stung by a bee. Everyone raised their hand except one child. Having been stung many times, Richard shared his experience about how to best to handle bee stings. Only a small percentage of the population are seriously allergic to bees, but there seems to be a lot of fear about being stung. Richard often helps people to feel comfortable around bees and to realize that they are actually gentle and only defensive when threatened (true for the European Honeybees that we work with!)


The first grade has been studying the natural world and insects in particular. Connecting the behavior of bees to geometry and science, Richard talked about bees and their communication through triangulation, performing the waggle dance.


Richard also assigned some homework! We use centrifugal force when spinning the honey out of the frames. Centrifugal force can be experienced at home by spinning in a circle with your arms hanging loose…they start to come up and out away from your body. Another fun home experiment is to set out a dish of honey and watch for the bees. First you will see one or two (the scouts!) and when more bees start to appear, you will know that they are doing the waggle dance and telling the other bees where to find the honey!


The observation hive is always a hit! Not able to bring a hive and bees from Hawaii, Richard borrowed the observation hive and bees from beekeeper and queen breeder Tom Glenn. Tom is breeding VSH (Varroa sensitive hygenic) queens, which we are all hoping is a long term solution to the varroa mite problem.


Posted by Andrea Dean.

What are you looking for when you travel?

When I travel I am looking to connect with the people and the place in a deep and authentic way. Yes… I want to read books and improve upon my tan, but I also want to feel connected to something outside of my ordinary range of experience.

I just got back from a trip to Fiji and was deeply touched by the depth of my visitor experience. I stayed in a number of places that were owned and run by Fijians, and in some cases owned and run by the village. The connection between my visitor dollars and the good it did in the communities where I stayed was real and immediate. I never felt so good spending money! In exchange, I got to experience Fijian nature and culture in a real, authentic way.

Given my interest in food self-sufficiency, I was always on the lookout for how people were growing and harvesting food. In summary- cassava and taro, everywhere! There was no formal “agri-tourism,” but every experience was an opportunity to sample native foods. On the outer islands, you don’t go to the food store for your food you go to the land and sea.

At one point I was sharing granola bars with some villagers. “Are these Hawaiian snacks?” they asked. “Well…not exactly, I bought them at Costco.” And then I found myself having to explain what Costco was to the people who brought me a dinner the night before that consisted entirely of foods they grew or harvested from the ocean on that day.

Agriculture in Hawaii is second only to tourism in terms of an economic driver- and some farms have married the two together creating “agri-tourism” on the Big Island. Visiting working farms is a great way to connect with Hawaii residents, explore new areas of the island, and sample the bounty of the land.

Volcano Island Honey has been welcoming visitors to the bee farm, or “apiary,” for over 20 years. The bees have so much wisdom to share with us about how to live gently on the earth and in community with one another. Richard Spiegel, owner of Volcano Island Honey has been passionate about the bees and the environment for over 30 years.

Visiting Volcano Island Honey is always an authentic experience because Richard wears his heart on his sleeve (or his bee suit, as the case may be!) When you visit, Richard (resident beekeeper-hippy-lawyer-philosopher) shares his personal and professional philosophy evolved from over 30 years of working with the bees.

Next time you are visiting Hawaii, or have friends or family visiting you- consider spending part of a day at Volcano Island Honey. The company has just launched a new Private Artisan Apiary Tour designed to give visitors more one-on-one time with Richard and the Bees. (You even get to put on a bee suit and explore the inside of a hive, but you don’t have to!)

Posted by Andrea Dean.

Richard Spiegel, Owner of Volcano Island Honey Co, just got back from a trip to the East Coast to visit family, friends, and bees. He went to Vermont and stopped in for a visit with Ross Conrad, Owner of Dancing Bee Gardens and author of Natural Beekeeping, which has been a source of inspiration for beekeepers at Volcano Island Honey for years.

Richard found that he and Ross share a similar philosophy when it comes to beekeeping and the role of bees on the earth. Volcano Island Honey produces an organic, artisan honey that requires a high degree of attunement with the cycles of the bees. In order to maintain a close relationship with the bees Richard has kept the business intentionally small, managing between 130-150 hives. Most commercial beekeepers manage thousands of hives. Speaking to the organic approach in Natural Beekeeping, Ross Conrad says, “This emphasis on quality over quantity is perhaps the defining notion of the organic agricultural movement.”

A focus on quality over quantity has made Volcano Island Honey the company that it is. VIHC always leaves enough honey for the bees, so that the hive can maintain itself in the way that nature intended. Many large commercial apiaries take all of the honey from the bees and then feed the bees sugar- not their natural food! VIHC also uses “bee escapes” as a less invasive and non-violent way to vacate bees from the hive before harvesting. This is more labor intensive, but it is more gentle to the bees and does not kill bees. VIHC respects the bees as intelligent beings and teachers, instead of as a tool for making honey and money. We also make our own wax foundation, using our own beeswax to avoid beeswax from other sources that may be contaminated by toxins & chemicals.

Richard sees the bees as teachers- even after working closely with the bees for over 30 years he continues to learn lessons from the bees. Bees teach us many things about cooperative society and environmental sustainability. Beekeeping is an agricultural endeavor that has a positive environmental footprint. The bees give back and make the environment in which they live a better place. Not only do they share their incredible gifts of honey and wax, but they also help pollinate the area and increase the agricultural output of the trees and plants. Quoting Ross from Natural Beekeeping, “The honey bee inspires me to work into my daily life this lesson: That we should give something back and improve upon things, thus making the world a better place.” VIHC strives to make the world a better place through conscious management of every aspect of the business. However, even with all of this striving, it is very hard to create a positive environmental impact while running a business. The activities of the bees are an environmental plus, but the impact of the human activities of packaging and shipping are hard to avoid and hard to mitigate. “It is easy to talk about being a sustainable business, but it is very hard to live these things, try as we might,” says Richard Spiegel.

Bees are truly one of the natural wonders of the world- they make honey and wax- two things that humans have found very useful for thousands of years. Humans have figured out how to make wax from petroleum (yuck! beeswax candles are superior in every way!) but not to make honey. “Honey is something so precious and special; even with our highly developed technological sciences, we humans still have not been able to duplicate the efforts of the simple honey bee and create the same substance from what amounts to nothing more than sugar and water,” says Conrad in Natural Beekeeping. VIHC believes in using the honey as close to its natural state as possible and keeps the honey raw. Just like Volcano Island Honey, Dancing Bee Gardens also produces organic, raw honey.

So who’s smarter- Man or Bee? Well…you decide!

Watch this video of Ross Conrad speaking about his discovery of beekeeping and his all-natural methods for maintaining a healthy and thriving bee population.

Richard Spiegel and the team at Volcano Island Honey Company have been practicing and promoting sustainable business and sustainable agriculture for 30 years. VIHC has attracted international attention for its exquisite, artisan honey and innovative business practices. But perhaps Richard’s most influential work was done quietly at home, in the garden. The world’s most important and unrecognized job- raising children!







Following in the organic family footsteps, Richard’s daughter Shaina had a career at QAI (Quality Assurance International), one of the world’s largest organic certifiers. When Shaina left QAI to focus on raising her children, she continued to weave her belief in organic agriculture into her home life. Shaina’s homestead, in a small country town north of Escondido, California, has a sizable organic garden, chickens, avocado, fruit and nut trees.







This blog post was inspired by some pictures (above) that Shaina recently sent to Richard of grandchildren Hayden, Sierra and Leila Jane, on harvest day at their homestead. All three helped harvest, prepare, cook and then enjoyed eating a delicious meal from their garden.







Known as “the plant lady,” Shaina has been instrumental in getting a school garden program off the ground (or into the ground as the case may be!) at her son Hayden’s school. Richard loves seeing the positive influence of a healthy, natural lifestyle on his grandchildren and the other children that Shaina works with.


“My daughter Shaina grew up around the organic honey business and in our organic garden in Hawaii. Shaina and her children are proof that we can change the world and influence many suceeding generations by living what we believe,” says Richard. “What a great legacy.”


In addition to nurturing our own children, Volcano Island Honey Company hosts lot of school groups at the farm. Over the years, hundreds of school children have learned about the bees and enjoyed taking home their own little jars of honey with spoons.


How sweet is that?


Posted by Andrea Dean

Volcano Island Honey Co. (VIHC) was recognized for its ongoing commitment to social and environmental principles in business as the winner of this year’s Kuleana Award. The Kuleana Award is presented each year at the Kona-Kohala Chamber of Commerce Kuleana Green Business & Environment Conference. VIHC is a member of Green America and the Kuleana Green Business Program- both programs which screen businesses for social and environmental practices.

A Leader in Triple Bottom Line Businesses on the Big Island and the State of Hawaii
Richard Spiegel started Volcano Island Honey Company as a hobby in the late 1970’s and formalized the business around 1993. Before anyone on the Big Island even heard of “triple bottom line” business, Richard was doing it. I think it can safely be said that Volcano Island Honey Company is the original “triple bottom line” business of the Big Island, and maybe even in the state. Even though VIHC is a small company, from the beginning Richard was passionate about caring for employees and the community, making as little environmental impact as possible, improving the environment whenever possible, making a profit, and sharing the profits with employees and the community through non-profit donations. He has codified these practices into the business and calls Volcano Island Honey Co. a business with an “Uncommon Philosophy.” Read more about the specific environmental and socially responsible practices of Volcano Island Honey Co.


An Environmental Advocate
Richard has taken a leading role in the beekeeping industry to advocate for safe and non-toxic treatment of varroa mites. The general trend is to use toxic chemicals in hives, which the mites eventually develop resistance to. This is bad for bees, people, environment and the agricultural industry that relies on bees. He could care just about his own business, but he has spent many precious hours fighting for all the bees, the environment, and our agriculture industry. Richard has also worked for years to preserve the Puako Kiawe forest instead of having it developed into a golf course. The Puako Kiawe forest, located on the South Kohala coast on the Big Island, is one of the largest contiguous kiawe forests in the state, is a major forage habitat for bees, and a potential source of firewood, and other value-added products. VIHC, in partnership with Neil Logan, has developed a conservation and sustainable management proposal for the forest with the intention of identifying a philanthropic investor who can take advantage of the tax benefits of a conservation purchase.


Most people think of kiawe as a junk tree, but VIHC knows better. VIHC has invested over ten thousand dollars into the study of the community economic and environmental benefit of kiawe. Did you know that the bean makes a high protein flour? It is a delicious cooking flour and could help contribute to island food self-sufficiency!


Posted by Andrea Dean.