Honey with a bite
It’s the condiment that’s heating up and transforming tastebuds with its juxtaposition of sweet and spicy. Hot honey’s popularity has exploded in the US, and it’s been quietly making its way onto our grocery shelves thanks to the innovation of a couple of Kiwi brands.
Sweet Sting was the first to market two years ago, born out of what the founders say is a classic lockdown story. During that tenuous time when we all found ourselves pacing at home: baking, exercising and drinking (or a combination of all three); neighbours Dan Bycroft and Chris Bulman found themselves without work and a lot of free time. Chris is an entrepreneur who had a side business exporting New Zealand Manuka honey into the United States and Dan worked in fashion. As Dan explains, ‘Chris had a lot of honey in his garage so we started to think about the different ways we could use it.’ Aware of the trend in the US for hot honey but having never tried it the pair started playing around with combinations, trying 20 chilli varities until they found the perfect blend.
‘Now, it’s grown to our specifications, it has the best flavour profile and consistency of heat. We must plan how much we need for production, which is tricky as we grow and scale, we take as much as we can. We’re pretty serious about our chilli, we don’t even show photos of it, it’s our little secret.’
‘The ratio is mainly honey, we infuse the chilli and then strain it out which leaves flecks of chilli and seed. We keep all the strained bits of chilli and honey, it’s a beautiful sticky, viscous glob, and use it as a cooking additive in our other sauces. This means we eliminate waste.’
Hot honey originates from South America but has become a household condiment in America thanks to Mike’s Hot Honey. The story goes that Mike Kurtz tried it in Brazil on pizza in the early 2000s and took it back to the New York pizzeria where he worked. Customers asked if they could buy bottles to take home and it quickly became a word-of-mouth sensation. It now has a turnover of over $40 million a year and is available everywhere from restaurants to specialty food stores even in some Walmarts.
It's this type of growth that Sweet Sting is looking for too. Their first customers, aside from friends and family, were Farro, Moore Wilson’s and some New World stores.
‘We have a distribution partner in Melbourne who put us in high-end retailers like the David Jones Grocer in Sydney. Others have seen us in there and reached out – we have had interest from the US from being seen on that shelf.’
They are in around 150 Woolworths stores across Australia with their three honey-based sauces. ‘We have expensive ingredients; we only use the best, so the volume helps us get some of those unit costs down to make it more accessible.’
My Food Bag has also expanded their reach by putting their honey in recipe sachets. Originally for a pizza drizzle, they’ve since created bespoke honey for them as they kept wanting different versions. They are now a regular customer.
Another small win was when Australian food influencer Andy Cooks used Sweet Sting and filmed it for his millions of followers.
Dan enjoys Sweet Sting in many ways, the most obscure is in his morning coffee, but its most popular use is drizzled across pizza. It works beautifully as a glaze for meat, it’s also a delight in chilli honey margaritas.
The second brand to launch a hot honey product is Apostle, a boutique condiment business from the Kapiti Coast. Mat Watkins and Lydia Parfield launched Apostle in 2018 starting with three chilli based sauces at the Martinborough Fair.
‘Chilli products can be polarizing, people assume a hot sauce is not nice, fiery and acidic and that’s pretty much all that was available then. None of our sauces are prohibitively spicy, they have a good level of flavour to enhance what you’re eating.’
Apostle launched a hot honey version last year, with a difference. Saint Valentine is infused with botanicals lavender, rosemary and oregano as well as sweet golden New Zealand honey infused with habanero chillies.
‘Customers will say, ‘I tried it on toast, it wasn’t so great, which is one of the hurdles. Think salty or fatty food to counteract with the acid sweetness. It’s perfect as a finishing sauce. The lavender makes it fantastic with lamb and French cooking. We love it with popcorn, in a pan melt a knob of butter, drizzle hot honey and then toss with popcorn and salted caramel.’
Apostle sauces stand out on the shelves at Farro and Moore Wilson’s and selected boutiques. They have 129 stockists in New Zealand and 40 plus in Australia. Yet they’re not in a rush to go mass.
‘We initially contacted Farro and Moore Wilson’s and after that, everyone else approached us. Our branding is what makes us stand out.’
Branding was an important factor for the pair who wanted their chilli-infused products to differ from the masculine, fiery versions that had previously dominated the shelves.they wanted gentle, peaceful, loving products with Christian iconography, pagan art, tarot and Anglo-saxon references. The result is most definitely pretty.
‘Perhaps if we were smarter businesspeople, we would have made a brand that was more commercial looking, but we wanted something that would stand out, be beautiful and have its place on display. We want people to show off their favourite condiments. As a consumer you buy with your eyes first so you’re more inclined to buy a product if it looks as good as it tastes. And we can’t be a cheap product, our ingredients are premium, and we won’t compromise on quality. So, we can never sit at the cheapest price point, and we don’t want to.’ it