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What’s in the honey, honey?

Food/Drink / by

The other day, Feyma offered to cook me some biscuits for breakfast, and I readily accepted her offer.  It sounded good.  She told me that we had some honey, and asked if I wanted to have some honey on my biscuits.  Sure thing!  Sounded delicious, so I was looking forward to a delicious breakfast.

I usually eat breakfast in my office while I am working, and that day was no exception.  When my nephew brought my biscuits and honey, it looked quite good.  The honey, though, did look a little different from what I was used to seeing.  It was dark brown instead of the more normal golden color of honey.  But, hey, I didn’t really think much of it, honey does come in different shades of color, I suppose.  So, I put some honey on my biscuit and had a bite.

Hmm.  Is that honey?

I asked Feyma if that was really honey that she sent up to me, and she said that it was.  My next question was, “what’s in the honey, honey?”  It sure didn’t taste anything like honey.  In fact, it tasted like Rum, or as they spell it here in the Philippines, Rhum.  What?  How could honey taste like Rum? Well, it did!  I asked Feyma to taste it, and she confirmed to me that it tasted like Rum to her too.  Strange.

But, I figured out why, or at least why I think it tasted like Rum.  Want to know why I think?

Well, this may be quite surprising to many people who have not spent significant time in the Philippines, but a lot of liquid type products are packaged in used rum bottles!  Yes, it’s true.  The old pint sized bottles from the Tanduay Rhum are recycled, and used to put other products in them.  Honey is something that I often see packaged in a used Tanduay bottle.  In fact, the honey bottle even says on it (part of the molding of the glass) “Tanduay Rhum” right on the glass at the bottom of the bottle!  So, you see, I am figuring that the bottle was not empty, still had rum in it, and honey was added, by accident.

These used rum bottles are supposed to be washed before being re-used, but there is just no way this was washed.  And, not only was it unwashed, but it had to have a significant amount of rum in the bottle, because what is inside is more the color of rum than honey, and also tastes like rum, with only a slight sweetness to it.  Also, while honey is usually very thick, this was thin just a little thicker than water!  Ha ha… can you imagine?

Some may not believe me that products are re-packaged into used rum bottles, but it is really true, and it is very common here in the Philippines.  In addition to honey, I often see vinegar in old rum bottles.  And, guess what?  I am not talking about stuff being sold on the streets, roadside or whatever, I am talking about products on the grocery store shelves!  This honey that we had was purchased at a grocery store here in Davao.  In fact, I have seen products (particularly vinegar) from major manufacturers that is in used Tanduay bottles!  Isn’t that amazing?

Anyway, I did not eat my biscuits with honey the other day, I just could not handle having biscuits with rum for breakfast!  So, I just had butter on my biscuits instead.  It was my first time, though, to have a product in a used Tanduay bottle that actually tasted like rum!

What a breakfast!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Geez Bob,im glad you didnt eat that wheres the quality control hahaha?Probably the same place as meat in the markets lol.Im telling my age , you just reminded me of the glass bottles being reused by the milk company when i was young when we had milk brought to our door.Recycling is good if done properly.

  2. What a breakfast!
    Ahaha.Last week my Aunt bought a bottle of (Tanduay rum) in a store and handed it over to my uncle who is by then drinking with his friends.When they opened it, they immediately noticed the smell, it wasn’t rum at all.

    It was GAS! LOOOOOOL.

    And yes, in Sari-sari stores they sometimes recycle Tanduay Bottles and put Gas on it.
    LOOOOOOOOOOL.

  3. Bob
    Well I like the idea of recycling but there should be some steps is place to ensure the bottles are washed clean and disinfected before re use.
    You should have used the honey in your morning coffee to start your day off with some swagger.

  6. Bob: You may have stumbled upon a great marketing idea. “Honey and rhum double your fun”, or “Just a dab get’s your taste bud’s dancing”or “flapjacks never had it so good”. (lol)

    Cheers my friend:

  7. Hi Bob,
    Ha Ha,free Rum with the honey!
    Although i’m all for recycling,just don’t hit the Rhum and honey bottle too often Lol.
    regards,Chas.

    • Hi chas – But.. actually I got ripped off, because honey is much more expensive than rum is here! So, they held back on the expensive stuff and loaded up the bottle with dirt cheap rum!

    • Hi Bob,

      Don’t throw the honey rhum my friend. You still can consume it as a perfect skin moisturizer. Dab a little amount on your face then wash with warm water. Voila!! your skin becomes smooth and supple (also your palm because of effect of Tanduay,, LOL).

      Am too is fond of natural honey. Yes, sometimes it tastes a little bit of alcohol especially when the honey is quite mature already. (So, real honey tastes better when aged, as opposed to the usual honey we see everyday. Please, no offense to the honeys on board. Just a JOKE to spice up Bob’s ruined breakfast.)

    • Bob… now I know. The honey biscuits looks yummy. Maybe I’ll try doing that too.

      El Moro… so, I guess the same with the real honey, age old wine tastes better than a young wine. ^_^.

  9. Might be a healthy idea to pass on anyting in those bottles Bob..could have been a heck of alot worse !!

  10. Seriously though. Now I am concerned about quality control if your buying products in a grocery store in which the container has not been cleaned. So there may be other bacteria present in other containers. Is it something to be concerned about or just stay away from recylced containers in the PI?

  11. But then, we have all the China food products with chalk, melamine, etc, so hard to trust anything these days unless it is fresh product.

  14. Bob,
    Thank you for posting this…a few years ago Daisy and I also purchased ‘Honey in a Rum Bottle’ – for our morning oatmeal. What a joke! How strange! This was from a national grocery chain store. I think it was ‘Xxxx Xxxx’ but I am not sure. I have the bottle with me now (empty) and I look at it as I type this. They are the sort of bottle that has a curve built into it so it would conform to ones body shape.
    Are there any honey-holics out there?
    I thought it was kinda cute!
    Thanks for verifying that I was not dreaming…
    Ha Ha.
    Jade

    • addendum to my comment:
      Since that one purchase I have been on the lookout for another jar of that ‘Rum Bottle Honey’ but to no avail. (out of stock, sir)
      Only in the Philippines!
      Jade

    • Hi Jade – I never thought about the honey-holics! Hi, I’m Bob, and I like honey. It’s been 6 months since I last indulged… and to the head of the honey-holics society, Winnie the Pooh… ha ha…. 😆

  16. Bob,

    Makes perfect sense to me … first they used gasoline to sterilize the bottles, but then it tastes a little weird so they poured a little rum back in the bottles to rinse them out before pouring the watered down honey in to sell. Quality control? Who needs any stinking quality control.

    Meanwhile, recently we Americans got all bent out of shape cause a few people came down with salmonella poisoning from eating contaminated eggs and our solution was to close down half the chickens farms, and recall and destroy a few million eggs. I only heard one news reporter state the obvious … don’t eat the eggs “over easy” (runny tokes) but cook them a little longer or scramble the eggs (which kills the salmonella).

    If your so called honey pours like water that means one thing — the producer has tried to maximize profit by watering the honey down. Real honey is pretty thick.

    We raised honey bees when I was a kid on the farm. You could even tell where the bees had gathered the pollen — a major difference in the taste of clover honey and honey made from bitter weeds gathered later in the year.

  17. Hi Bob
    I like to support the local economy too but you have to be careful. As ar as some products go I’d rather by the store bought stuff. As for honey if processed wrong it can kill you…

  18. A couple of thoughts. 1. Where we live, from time to time people come by the house selling fresh, unprocessed honey from wild hives in the neighborhood that they have been commissioned to destroy. (Soe of the bees here are terrible!) Best hoeny you can buy. 2. for all os us who have arthitis, take a tablespoon of this raw honey and a tablespoon of organic, unprocessed vinegar (try Braggs, available in most big supermarkets in the Philippines) in a glass of warm water. this has worke miracles for me and others I know. 3. True story of glass bottles. After the War, all the glass bottle making capacity in the Philippines had been destroyed. San Miguel encouraged its distributors to buy up and smash the bottles of its competitors. No bottles, no beer. this is how San Miguel achieved its monopoly on beer in this country from 1946 to the 1980s.

    • Hi Don – we have lots of vendors come by the house to sell various products, but we never had a honey vendor! I like honey and would probably buy some if it looked good. I didn’t know about the glass bottle thing… very interesting.

  20. Hi Bob – Strange story and you were very lucky just imagine if the two drunks that Feyma wrote about the other day had used it prior to it be in filled with honey.
    I’m sure your reaction would have been slightly different. If you had purchased the honey anywhere other than the Philippines with a good lawyer you probably would be a richer man by now.
    Regards.
    Jim.

    • Hi Jim – Ha ha… as a matter of fact, it did cross my mind the connection between Feyma’s article and mine! Ha ha… good lawyer.. hmm.. I had not thought of that!

      • be much cheaper to just have someone that files a lawsuit killed, then risk paying them big money in some claim like that, in non 3rd world country’s you would be rich from that, try to make a legit claim there and either the case will be stalled indefinitely or you will get shanked

  21. Honey on biscuits, never heard of that, but it sounds quite nice. In the picture, the “biscuits” look soft like cakes though, which would be nice. Can’t imagine honey on a crispy digestive biscuit though. As for the addition of rhum…might be nice if it was a deliberate addition, in a measured small dose.

    Do you think you’ll be buying any more honey in that kind of bottle? 🙂

    • Hi Jim – What Aussies and Brits call biscuits are what Americans call cookies and are a completely different thing from American biscuits. That’s why the picture looks different from what you are used to!

    • Hi Jim- The buscuits look and taste more like the scones we get in the UK. I had them nearly every day when on holiday in the US for breakfast.We have a Marks & Spencers now in CdeO and can get plain and chocolate digestives as well as custard creams and shortbread expensive but who cares.
      Regards.
      Jim

  22. Randy W said, honey is ‘also good on peanut butter sandwiches.” Seriously, honey on a peanut butter sandwich? Smuckers? I wouldn’t mind eating eating honey and biscuits. I don’t know what rhum taste though. He he.

  23. When I was a little kid, about the age of 10, my favorite thing to do in the dog days of summer when the next year of school was approaching was to get a couple of pieces of caraway rye toast spread with Sue Bee whipped honey and climb up the maple tree in our front yard and eat them up in the tree. I don’t remember how I climbed up that tree with those honey sandwiches … maybe mom handed them up to me when I had reached my favorite branch!
    Jade

  24. .this post has nothing to do with honey, but a note on the quality control lol, when i was living there in pampanga AC there was this super market called Jumbo Jenra and after a few months there i decided i would buy a real bbq grill and make some bbq cheese burgers mmm yummy, so i go to the meats area and found the hamburger mmm ( looks more red then it should ) but hey its expensive so must be good stuff right ? so i get 2 kilo’s of that and spend attest 20 minutes trying to find mustard LOL… easy to find ketchup but not mustard. but i found it and grabbed some onion lettuce tomato bacon and cheese expensive cheese imported from Switzerland or something, and some french fries, got home and got the grill fired up… the girls visiting me was excited, i was excited mmm can taste it now… i make about 1 kilo of that in to burgers and noticed as i cooked this, it was very hard to keep them from falling apart ( my first clue something was not right ) but the real test was when i started eating this garbage burger hehe so disappointed, funny my Filipino girl friend’s loved it and asked for more, but me i knew for sure this was in no way any form of hamburger i had ever tasted before, so i stopped eating it, to this day i still have no idea what it was, but the other American i talked with that lived next door said it was a good chance it was water buffalo or dog hehe. ( my mother always said you get what you pay for ) now i can honestly tell her that is not always correct haha.

          • I just recently had a buffalo burger in Edinburgh in Scotland of all places – cost me the equivalent of 220 pesos.Was better than most burgers and when inquiring found that the buffalo farm was in a little village called Auchtertool in Fife where my grandfather was born. They are water buffalo – the same as Pinoy carabao.

            • i don’t know if it is the same, but i think not, because i have also heard from some of my friends that buffalo tastes good, but this burger was not good.

              and to be honest i even had dog at someones birthday party before they tricked me lol, and it taste real close to how that tasted ( not so good )

  25. it’s sorta a discount super market, after that experiance i always shoped at SM hyper market and never had that trouble again, but prices even more exspsensive 😛

  26. I think you may be mistaken about their being Rum in the bottle. I can’t stand the local honey because of the way it is procured it always ferments. Though its possible to pick up flavors of previously stored things in bottles even if their is none of it left. The only exception I have had is when we bought some directly from a local who harvested it themselves (within hours of harvesting it) and we kept it in the freezer to prevent fermentation. We did this the same day it was harvested and it still had so much extra crap in it and was so thin it wasn’t very good. Way more pollen than I’m used to and I like a bit in my honey.

    I’m told the local method of extraction is to start a fire under the hive/tree, melt all the wax and collect everything that comes out. Several things wrong with this method. First most of the honey is probably not thoroughly dehydrated so its guaranteed to ferment. I used to keep bees we wouldn’t harvest unless the honey was 90% capped, that will never happen in a whole hive in the tropics. You have to harvest selectively. Also all the pollen bee bread royal jelly and pupae come out in the mess this guarantees it will ferment within the day.

    If you want what your used to you need to buy the imported stuff from a grocery. Its still not very good in my opinion but it’s what people are used to and its ridiculous expensive too. I prefer raw honey and what you buy in a grocery is cooked to delay crystallization. Most of the health benefits are cooked away.

    If you can buy some from a harvester within hours of harvest it can be salvageable but it will be thin because its not ripe. It would have to be kept in the freezer too. Not the refrigerator as that only slows fermentation a bit and makes it crystallize fast.

    So in short I think you bought mead 😉

    • Hi John – Well, I can’t say if you are right or not about the rum. What I do know is that I have been buying local honey for over 10 years now, and have been happy with it. Yes, it tastes a little different than the honey we would get back in the States, but I have always been OK with that. This, honey, though, tasted exactly like Tanduay, and was in a Tanduay bottle as well. Whatever the reason, it tasted like Tanduay Rum.