Honey Handkerchiefs

The honey handkerchiefs are a great artful way to add honey flavor to a dish. Wow your diners by adding some height, movement and crunchiness to your dessert.

Molecular gastronomy chef Ferran Adrian is the creator of these honey handkerchiefs and he uses one of his products called Crumiel to make them. Crumiel is honey in its crystallized form and it comes in very small irregular granules. I used the honey granules from Willpowder which are a little larger so I first powdered them using a spice grinder. The honey granules are produced via a co-crystallization process with refinery syrup (sucrose) and dried to granular form.

Ingredients (5 servings)

- 100g (3.5 oz) honey granules or powdered honey

Preparation

1- If using larger granules, first grind them into powder using a spice or coffee grinder.

2- Preheat oven to 155 °C (310 °F).

3- Sprinkle about 20 g (1 oz) of powdered honey on tray with silicon mat to create a very thin layer. Start with small amounts until you get used to this technique.

4- Place tray in the oven for about 5 minutes until you see the powdered honey melting. Don’t leave it too long or the honey will burn.

5- Remove tray from oven and let it cool for 30 s to 1 min.

6- Place the tray under a heat lamp and start lifting one edge of the melted honey layer and pulling it with your fingers. If the honey is too hot it will tear apart and if it cooled down too much it will crack. You may have to try a couple of times until you get the right temperature. You can do it without a heat lamp but the honey film will get cold and hard fast after you lift it so you will have to work quickly.

7- Keep lifting, pulling and spreading from different parts of the honey film to create the handkerchiefs.

8- Use immediately or reserve in an airtight container with a bag of silica gel desiccant to absorb moisture.