Have you ever looked in your cabinet, been out of sugar, but glanced at your bottle of honey and wondered, “how can I substitute honey for sugar?

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One of our goals is self-sufficiency, and let’s face it: Not only is processed sugar BAD for you, you can’t make it yourself. Honey, on the other hand, you can make with the help of our friends, the honeybees. In this post you will find how honey is made, the benefits in using honey and you will also find “best practices,” because although you certainly can substitute honey for sugar, it also means you need to take some extra steps to ensure your recipe turns out well.

How honey is made

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Honey is a natural, sweet liquid produced by bees from the nectar of flowers which plays a vital role sustaining and nourishing bee colonies. Each bee will make, on average, about half a teaspoon of honey in its lifetime. Considering the tons of honey produced each year, that’s a lot of bees at work! The honeybee (Apis Mellifera) collects nectar from flowers in its mouth. Enzymes in the bee’s saliva cause a chemical reaction that turns the nectar into honey, which is deposited into the walls of the hive. The texture and flavour of the honey depends on which flowers the honeybees choose to collect from.

Nutritional highlights

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Honey is made up of fructose (40%), glucose (30%), water and minerals such as iron, calcium, potassium and magnesium. Due to the high level of fructose, honey is sweeter than table sugar. Honey is a high carbohydrate food and has a GI value of 55 (moderate range). Some varieties of honey have a lower GI however, because of fluctuating fructose levels (the more fructose, the lower the GI). Honey is still high in calories and causes increases in blood sugar.

Tablespoon (15g) honey provides

64kcal
17.3g carbohydrate
0.1g protein
0g fat

The Difference Between Baking With Honey And Sugar

Honey is a powerful sweetener, so use less of it

The last thing you want is to bite into the perfect cookie…only to have it be WAY to sweet to enjoy. Honey also has more flavor than sugar, which is great….but it can overwhelm all the other flavors in your baked good. So, you need to use less of it when you substitute honey for sugar.

Use less of other liquids in your recipe

When you substitute honey for sugar, you’re adding more liquid to your recipe, because honey is about 20 percent water. To make up for it, you’ll need to reduce the amount of the OTHER liquids in your recipe. For every 1 cup of sugar you’re substituting, reduce the other liquids by 2 tablespoons. If you’re replacing ½ cup of sugar with honey, then reduce the other liquids by 1 tablespoon. If you’re replacing less than ½ cup of sugar, then you don’t need to reduce the other liquids.

Lower oven temperature by 25 degrees

Because honey has a higher sugar content (see #1), it cooks quicker and can burn easier than sugar. You’ll need to lower the oven temperature by 25 degrees to make up for it. Be sure to check your baked goods often so you don’t accidentally burn them.

Add baking soda so you don’t make hockey pucks

Honey is much denser than granulated sugar, so it can easily make your baked goods turn into meaty hockey pucks. Not good. For every cup of honey you use in a recipe, add ¼ teaspoon of baking soda. The baking soda will help your dough rise better.

Honey to sugar conversion chart

To make life easier, print out this article and keep these conversions handy

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Sources:

http://thefrugalchicken.com/substitute-honey-for-sugar/

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/sugar-substitutes-honey-explained