Really Easy Dandelion Honey/Syrup

My mom has cultivated a love for the dandelion with in me for sometime now. She has always filled my ear with how beneficial the dandelion is. So, I have done the same with my children. We welcome dandelions in our yard with open arms every year. I love how they speckle the yard like yellow polka dots! We never spray our lawn with anything which make dandelions okay for the picking!

I like to keep my eye open for good recipes that use dandelions and I found just that over at Mooberry-Farm. I followed her recipe exactly and it came out unbelievably good!

Her recipe called for 12 cups of dandelions. Don't worry, it sounds like a lot but it really isn't.

You will need 1 lemon. Use an organic lemon if you can, if not just wash the lemon really, really, good because you will be putting the whole thing into your honey. Make sure you have 3 cups of sugar and 6 cups of water.

Remove the stems from your flowers. You just need the yellow part. I just broke the stem off at the base of the flower. When you have finished removing the stems measure out 12 cups of the flowers. Put them into a soup or stock pot.

Slice up the lemon. Take the whole thing and throw it in with the flowers. Add 6 cups of water to the pot. Give it a stir. Bring the dandelions to a boil, then lower the heat and let it simmer for an hour. It will start to take on a lemony iced tea smell. Yumm.

Cover the dandelions when it is finished simmering and leave it to stand over night.

 In the morning , or when ever you have the time, get ready to make your honey.

Take cheese cloth and place it over a strainer which is placed over a large bowl to collect the dandelion water.

 Once you have dumped the dandelions into the cheese cloth pull up the ends of the cloth and give the whole thing a good squeeze. Get all the water out. You can compost the dandelion flowers, or throw them away.

 Now pour your dandelion water into a large stock pot. Add your sugar. Whisk it around to get the sugar dissolved over med. high heat. Bring to a boil and keep boiling for about an hour and a half, or so.

When it starts foaming and bubbling you know it's done. It will be like syrup once it's cooled. You can tell by sticking a spoon in the mixture and pull it out and letting it cool. You'll notice it's syrupy consistency. You can let it go a little longer with the bubbling and get a more honey type consistency.

Pull it from the heat and pour it into a sterilized 1 pint canning jar. I went a little over this amount, so I needed another half pint jar.

This turned out so perfect. When we put it in our tea we were amazed. We actually liked it more than honey!

Since we had a low year on maple production this will substitute nicely for recipes that call for syrup.

On one batch I made I left some in the pot and whisked in a few teaspoons of cinnamon. WOW!! Incredible! I canned it when I was finished just like the "plain" batch. This way I can add the cinnamon flavored syrup to my cereal recipe.

I am so happy we can bottle the flavor of spring! I know we'll appreciate it even more when winter is upon us again!