Name: Honey Bee
Total time: 3 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 60 ml Aged Jamaican rum; 15 ml Lemon juice; 15 ml Honey and water syrup; 7.5 ml Orange juice

Honey Bee
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Serve in a Coupe glass

Ingredients:
2 oz	Jamaican aged blended rum with funk
¹⁄₂ oz	Lemon juice (freshly squeezed)
¹⁄₂ oz	Honey syrup (3 parts honey to 1 water by weight)
¹⁄₄ oz	Orange juice (freshly squeezed) optional

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Coupe glass.
Prepare garnish of lemon zest twist.
SHAKE all ingredients with ice.
FINE STRAIN into chilled glass.
EXPRESS lemon zest twist over the cocktail and use as garnish.

Strength & taste guide:

No alcohol

Medium

Boozy

Sweet

Medium

Dry/sour

More cocktails with similar strength and taste profile

Review:

Rich honey balances tart lemon juice over a characterful rum-base. Most recipes omit the orange juice, but as David Embury says in his Bee's Knees recipe (more from him below), "The addition of a small amount of orange juice (about 1 to 2 parts) makes for an interesting variation." The additional subtle fruitiness also sits well with Jamaican rum funk.

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Variant:

With light rum this drink becomes a Honeysuckle, and with gin in place of rum, it becomes a Bee's Knees. With bourbon this is a Gold Rush.

History:

The 1949 edition of Esquire's Handbook for Hosts says a Honey Bee is "1 part honey, 4 parts Bacardi, 1 part lemon juice. Mix well, then add ice and shake."

However, in his 1948 The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks, under his recipe for a Bee's Knees, David Embury handily explains, "The same drink except for the use of white Cuban rum in place of gin, is known as the Honeysuckle. The same drink with Jamaica rum is the Honey Bee. The Honeysuckle is also sometimes called the Airmail. Since Embury's era, an Airmail has become accepted as being a Honeysuckle lengthened with champagne.

Nutrition:

One serving of Honey Bee contains 162 calories

Alcohol content:

1.3 standard drinks
18.1% alc./vol. (18.1° proof)
17.6 grams of pure alcohol

Difford’s Guide remains free-to-use thanks to the support of the brands in green above. Values stated for alcohol and calorie content, and number of drinks an ingredient makes should be considered approximate.

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John Hinojos

23rd August 2023 at 00:14

Had this again and it was just a good as before. This time we used Coruba Dark Jamaican rum. We had not been able to get the rum locally for awhile, but it is favoured by many of the tiki bars in Southern California. Used the orange juice also. Still one of our favourites.

Chris Dimal

8th August 2023 at 22:10

Utterly delicious. The Jamaican rum flavour is so damn beautiful with the honey.

Chris Dimal

28th May 2024 at 07:45

Update: Don't do orange juice. The drink turns flat.

John Hinojos

10th October 2022 at 01:35

Outstanding. We used 1/2 Jamaican and 1/2 Jamaican overproof Navy rums. It was unbelievable. Great Jamaican rum flavour and the additional punch from the overproof. Would be excellent with any Jamaican rum.