Raw Honey

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**This post has been entered in Things I Love Thursdays at The Diaper Diaries and Frugal Fridays at Life as Mom!**

Note: It's frugal because it is cheap and it has SO many awesome uses!!

Raw honey is a really great food. In fact, it's not just a food. It's also a medicine! I thought, since next week the first "Baby Steps in the Medicine Cabinet" is coming up, I might give you a place to start with home remedies.

Honey is a natural substance produced by bees to feed their young. It is thick and rich with a characteristic taste, which can change subtly depending on the bees' diet and location. It contains a lot of beneficial bacteria, which can help to kill bad bacteria in your system, balance yeast, and much more (depends on who you ask). It is great for baking, mixing in drinks, or just eating off a spoon. It is 1.5 times as sweet as table sugar so you don't need as much of it.

That's just a quick summary of honey's benefits, though. There are many, many more! Here are others:

*Honey is an effective cough syrup. It has been shown to be more effective than medicinal cough syrups and much safer for kids age 1 - 6 (and for adults!). It can help to kill the bacteria in your throat (if it's raw) as well as coating your throat and soothing it.

*Some say honey can increase fertility, especially when paired with raw goat's milk (especially in men).

*Honey can be used as a salve to treat wounds and ulcers, more safely than antibiotics and with no side effects. In parts of Europe, it is put on wounds and then the wound is bandaged, and the honey will keep the wound clean and help it to heal. (This is not accepted in the U.S. in general, unfortunately.) At home, use honey on burns and other wounds and dress it with clean gauze, instead of using an antibiotic cream.

*Honey and lemon, when used together, can help you lose weight by making fat stores into useable energy. Drink some honey-ginger lemonade to kick-start your metabolism and weight loss! (Which is also a great morning sickness cure, by the way.)

*Honey can help to cure allergies! By taking a teaspoon per day, a person can build up an immunity to the dust, pollen, and molds that are naturally found in the honey (which won't make you sick because of the good bacteria in it). This is where being LOCAL is really important, so you're exposed to the bacteria from your own environment.

*Honey can help cancer, because it has anti-tumor properties (check the resources for a link to a published study on this).

*Honey is a good moisturizer and can be used as a facial cleanser or mask, and in homemade shampoos.

*Honey is antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral, and it never spoils, so it can be used for many things and kept for a long time! Honey may crystallize, but this is normal. Heat the honey gently ON THE STOVE in a water bath (microwaves are bad!) and it will become clear again.

Remember, all these benefits (and more! check the resources) are achieved by RAW honey. The pasteurized honey you buy in the regular grocery store won't have all these amazing properties.

There is a special kind of honey called Manuka honey, which is produced in New Zealand. It is very strong and used for medicial purposes. It's rather expensive, too, but it can cure many different conditions, including MRSA staph infections (with no side effects and the MRSA can't become resistant to it!). Read the resources below to learn more about it. (I looked up buying some awhile back but 8 oz. can be up to $45!)

Resources
Raw Honey Benefits
Really RAW Honey Science
WHFoods Honey
Natural Health Ezine
Benefits of Manuka Honey

Do you use raw honey? What do you use it for? Where do you get yours? What's your favorite benefit (anything I haven't mentioned)?

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