Sugi Bee Garden honey has been around for decades and presumably popular, given the number of locations they are sold at in their home country, Japan. In Taiwan, this honey seemed to be a popular souvenir gift for older people from their relatives who had stopped in Japan. I usually saw one of these containers in my grandmother’s fridge in Taiwan when I visited.
To enjoy adding this to your drink, you should like honey and fruit flavours. Yuzu is the most common type you can find from other brands, so Sugi Bee Garden decided to set their honey apart by adding other things to their line. I think they had some 10 or 12 unique flavors when I was in the store. I think the only non-fruit flavor was maple.
You do have to use an appropriate amount of honey. My grandmother would stingily add two or three drops to mug of water and tell me this product was expensive. This meager quantity was not sufficient to add more than a hint of flavor to the water. Consequently, I could not really appreciate it when she tried to share it with me. (I also felt concerned when I noticed she had the same honey container with the same expiration date in her fridge three years in a row. I assume one of my aunts noticed and threw it out, because I did not see it a fourth year.)
How much honey would be a more ideal amount to add? A representative in the shop told me you need a ratio of 5:1 of water to honey. I usually just squeeze enough to fill the bottom of my mug, add some water, and mix with a spoon.
I like the flavored honey water; it is nice variety when one wants something with flavour that is not simply tea. However, I have heard that some people add the flavored honey to their tea! I personally do not recommend adding any sort of flavoured honey to an herbal or actual tea that is not very basic or in a situation where you have not thought out the combination; the flavours may not blend well and then some delicious things are wasted.
The squeeze top makes it easy to have flavored honey on toast or a cracker or many other things, and the salesperson made sure to remind me those are all possible. However, I actually have not met anyone who regularly does anything with Sugi Bee Garden honey besides add the honey to water.
Sugi Bee Honey gives a discount for buying above a certain amount and having an account with them. With the additional tax refund I would recover as a as visitor to Japan and my love of honey, it seemed worthwhile to me! I was allowed to sign up for an account despite not residing in Japan, the salesperson made sure to let me know, and I did.
In 2023, I purchased five tubes (one large 500 gram bottle and four small 300 gram bottles) and a package of 12 total single-serve packets of 6 flavours of honey. It came to less than 50 USD after the discounts and before the tax refund. Honey is a heavy souvenir, but the bottles are fortunately a light plastic rather than glass.
Although I purchased in Japan in 2023, I also know that there are stand-alone Sugi Bee Garden shops in Taiwan. According to an email I received this year, Sugi Bee Garden’s flavored honey is being sold in the US for the first time starting 2024.
