Thanks Jack. I have to keep it affordable for those who are prepared to go out of their way to come to our house. I also like the social side of it, at times. If we DO get a honey flow, it’ll build up fairly quick. I cater for people who use a lot of honey. I need to be able to shift it without me running all over the place to chase a few more dollars. I can spend that time in my vege garden instead.
One thing about dealing with a lot of people is that you get to meet all types. It’s a real education in human behavior. In the natural world, I think that the study of human behavior would have to be the most fascinating of all of nature.
This video shows a little bit of what I’m talking about. It’s a bit extreme, however fascinating.
I know what you mean Jeff- I studied anthropology at University, and also I lived in India for a couple of years on and off. I have seen the holy men in the mountains, standing on one leg for years, with 3 foot long fingernails and doing other extreme things to graphic to write here. All with a massive grin on their faces, albeit a half crazed look.
Bizarrely the more crazy the thing they do- the happier they seem to be.
I never visited the rat temple, but I heard all about it- and I went to the monkey one instead… However I stayed in a hotel in Rishikesh once- that was virtually a rat temple- big scorpions and small nasty looking black and orange snakes too. One day I saw 5 scorpions under my bed…
Hi Jack, wow that’s a great experience. Did you visit the Golden Temple? I read your reply to Wilma, on the part about the hotel, she said it’s a wonder you got out alive.
no I never made it to the Golden Temple- I went through the Punjab on a train once- and I saw it from the window- that’s as close as I got. I always wanted to go there for the free lunch- not because it’s free- just for the spectacle and apparently it’s delicious.
I saw it on Michael Palin’s Himalayan trip on tv. It was after watching them making chapati, that my bread making journey started. I started on Indian chapati, now I’m on French baguettes.
Hi Jack, I just want to share this story. Our favorite customer (not), turned up with his 2x3kg honey buckets to get filled. I told him I had none, I’ll put him on the list plus the price has gone up 50c a kilo. He nearly had a heart attack. Because he gets 6 kilos, he gets it for $6.20 a kilo (new price). I had to tell him 4 times what the new price was. He seriously said “gee, it’s getting expensive”. I said “well that’s the new price, I just wish I had some to sell”. He walked away with his containers & said that he’ll check up on some prices, he’ll phone me back. I had my bee suit on. I didn’t say any more. The only thing is he’ll be put further down the list when & if he does get back to us.
A chapati with fresh melted ghee is an awesomely good thing. Best I remember were in Mysore- South India.
When I won two ribbons for my honey at the royal show- a friend of a friend won the championship prize for the best loaf of bread in all categories- it was a dark rye. My friend managed to get me two slices and I had them toasted with butter and my own first prize medium amber honey… incredible! If only I could have secured the 1st prize butter too. Breakfast of champions- literally
I’d love to try a loaf of your bread Jeff- maybe you could post me one express. I’d pay and I wouldn’t be stingy either!
I once heard that baguettes are best on the second day?
My baguettes are better first day. Just after they have cooled down a bit.
The next day bits we let dry out to go into the freezer for breadcrumbs. For kangaroo schnitzels.
Hi Jack, I’ll just put that bloke last on the list. Blokes like him make life interesting. I love the entertainment. He normally leaves his containers when I’m out of honey, then I phone him when it’s ready.
The baguettes don’t keep long at all. They are made from just flour, water & salt with a tiny bit of yeast or a sour dough starter. I don’t think that the French like them after only a few hours out of the oven. Some of them buy it fresh for breakfast & then get fresh again for lunch. I like them fresh out of the oven. I make small ones, enough for 2 meals. Then as soon as they cool, I cut them in two before freezing them. I have them toasted for breakfast & lunch, thawing them out as I need them. I like the idea of French bread because there is no bread improver in the dough.
Without checking Google, do you know what the actual “breakfast of champions” was?
I agree with @JeffH, by the way, real baguettes are best the first day. If you just can’t eat it that first day, put it in the freezer on the day it was made. When you are ready to eat it, preheat the oven to 200C (400F). Take the baguette straight from the freezer, run a little cold water over the surface (this is a French baker’s trick) and put it in the oven for 10-14 minutes, depending on how big it is. You don’t need to defrost it first. The water on the surface actually helps to make the crust crispy and delicious - it sort of mimics the steam heat of a real French bread oven.
Hi Smithome,
Your friend’s brood box is just like yours. As long as the frames are deeps (and not mediums), it’s all the same. Think of the boxes as mobile rooms of an apartment that you add and take away, adjusting the hive to the seasons and the size of your colony. I know it’s super exciting to assemble and put to use your very own flow hive the way it was sold to you, but realistically, you’re not even putting the honey super on until the nectar flow starts, probably next spring. You’re likely to use all your boxes together down the line anyway. The fact that you have access to a box that smells like wax and honey already is a great thing! Move by that feeling of having to use your “own” equipment, his box IS your equipment now and you’ll be adding your own brood box to his in due time anyway, probably by spring to expand and strengthen your colony before putting the crowning glory up on top: the Flow Honey Super.
Wrong! While that might have been true once, the polite answer is actually a Martini cocktail. Kurt Vonnegut redefined the concept in 1973 in his book “Breakfast of Champions”.
It has since become urban slang for anything early morning that you mother would not approve of you doing or drinking or eating. I bet General Mills were upset when it became so corrupted!
Hi Dawn, my home oven mimics a French oven. I have a dish on the bottom tray with a few rocks in it. It preheats with the oven. At the time of putting the bread in the oven, I put a measured amount of water in the dish to get the desired crust. The more water used, the thicker the crust. I don’t like it too thick. You can literally make the thickness of crust that one desires.
If you have a Flow Hive Classic 6 frame - then a Langstroth 8 deep brood box will match up, or 8 x deep Langstroth frames.
You can add them to your Flow brood box, or you can have 2 x brood boxes depending on your climate.
It’s nice that you have someone willing to help you out with some frames/equipment.
Have you asked him if he will also be your mentor? Help you out with brood box inspections etc.
I’m sure that would help him be not such a Flow Hive skeptic because he will help you do the right thing with your bees, as well as help you out by being a well-educated beekeeper
Too wet in Newcastle today to disturb the bees, so have had to put off my pick up til Monday!!
But, after an entire winter without a drop of rain, I cannot be whinging
Will post photos
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While that might have been true once, the polite answer is actually a Martini cocktail. Kurt Vonnegut redefined the concept in 1973 in his book “Breakfast of Champions”.