You guys! Wonderful news! There was no bee rapture! Or, there may have been, but bees have managed to recover from it. This Slate article details the reasons why bees have rebounded from a historic low in population in 2008. In 2011, we joined a honey co-op run by a coworker on the roof of her apartment building in Uptown. She held a kick-off party at the start of summer to show everyone the hives, but on the day of the party, she went to check on the hive and almost all the bees were unexpectedly, unexplainably, dead. This was May 21, 2011, a rapture date predicted by that one crazy guy. It was a very eerie sight because the dead bees seemed to have died frozen in place. Rather than falling to the bottom of the hive, most of them were still hanging on to the frame. Bizzare. The honey co-op kickoff party turned into a fundraiser to purchase a new queen (which you can do on-line – they come in a small box inside a manilla envelope).

I celebrated Honey Day of Frost Month of the French Republican Calendar by making Smitten Kitchen‘s Honey Cake. It’s a perfect cake for morning coffee.

Honey Cake

3 1/2 cups flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

4 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1/2 tsp ground allspice

1 cup vegetable oil

1 cup honey

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

3 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup warm coffee or strong tea (I used earl grey)

3/4 cup fresh orange juice

I used a 10 cup bundt pan, but Smitten Kitchen’s recipe says that you can also use two 9-inch cake pans or a sheet pan. Heat oven to 350, spray your pan(s). Whisk the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves and allspice. Add the oil, honey, sugars, eggs, vanilla, tea and OJ. Mix together . Pour batter into baking pan and bake for 60 to 75 minutes for a bundt pan, less for cake and sheet pans.