Michelle Obama's Special Gift: White House Honey
By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers
What started out as a springtime lark meant to help Michelle Obama's South Lawn veggie garden—a simple beehive—has produced an abundance of sweet honey that the first lady is treating like gold. While initially planned for use in the first family's recipes, the light honey with a hint of mint from local basswood trees has been given an elevated role in the East Wing: It's the main feature in the first lady's gift packages. At the recent G-20 economic meeting in Pittsburgh, for example, the first lady had a wooden gift box made up for each of the visiting spouses. Inside were a tea set colored like the purple-and-white Lincoln china and a crystal vase with two little jars of White House honey. Etched on the vase: "White House Honey 2009." The remaining honey will be jarred for other gifts, used in the kitchen, and offered as tasty treats for visitors.
The homegrown gift is a White House rarity, say historians, which could make it the most sought-after nectar since Romans gave it to their gods.
The credit, of course, goes to the bugs. First beekeeper Charlie Brandts, a White House carpenter, says the bees produced some 10 to 12 gallons, about right for four hives. What's more, when their queen wasn't producing broods up to their standard, the worker bees replaced her, something beekeepers typically do by importing queens. "It's been a cool thing," says Brandts of his bees. "I'm happy that everybody has embraced them."
Illustration by Ed Wexler for USN&WR.
Tags: Michelle Obama
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Reader Comments
Wonderful Opportunity for BeeKeepers
Now is the time to stress the importance of local honey and it's health benefits to our great nation.
This is also a call for beekeepers to inform the President to take a position that will help assisting local honey producers so that they can be more competitive against foreign honey imports.
Note: Foreign honey imports do not produce the same health benefits.
the FLOTUS bees
It's all fun and games until the killer bees invade the hive and an unsuspecting Republican gets swarmed (or is that part of the plan?)
Even the bees have a vetting process
Sounds like Rahm Emanuel has been giving direction to the First Bees. The queen bee had to resign from the position, as the GOP was starting to get too critical of the honey production, and the administration needed to put out the best possible honey for Mme. Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel. Does John Boehner eat honey? The House Republicans tried to start a beehive, but could not agree on whether the queen bee should come from Texas, Alaska or Maine. Also, the bees kept insisting on a public option, so the GOP said, forget it, we'll just keep putting Nutra Sweet in our coffee.
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