Recipe

How to easily make honeycomb at home

honeycomb and honey dipper on a wooden plate on a white table

Shannon Thirumal and Jessica Taylor Yates

Posted August 09, 2022

Celebrating National Science Week just passed, we get abuzz with the science behind the sugar with this easy honeycomb recipe you can make from home. 

Homemade honeycomb is a light dessert that can be made with four simple ingredients. Watching it bubble, puff and crack makes it a fun recipe the whole family can enjoy. Plus, with urban beekeeping being totally buzzworthy, you can even make the honey straight from home.

But have you ever wondered how the bubbles in the honeycomb are created?

You won't have to wonder anymore, thanks to the chefs at RACV's Cape Schanck Resort. This simple honeycomb recipe is perfect for National Science Week. Budding young scientists can create and watch the heat from the sugar-mix break down the bicarbonate soda ingredient, causing it to release carbon dioxide gas. It's this gas that causes the bubbles in the honeycomb to deliciously expand! 

But don't take our word for it - break out your inner nutty professor and give it a yummy go.

honeycomb recipe

Budding young scientists will be buzzing around this delicious confectionery. 

 

Honeycomb recipe

Serves

4 or more

Prep time

20 min

Difficulty

Intermediate

Ingredients

  • 150 g white sugar, granulated 
  • 50 g honey 
  • 15 g glucose syrup  
  • 50 ml water 
  • 10 g bi carb soda

*Caution when working with hot sugar 

Method

  1. Mix the sugar, honey, glucose and water in a heavy-based 5 litre pot. 
  2. Place it on a stove and cook. You can mix the sugar until it starts to boil. After it starts boiling, do not mix, as it will cause the sugar to crystallise.  
  3. Now heat the until the sugar until it hits 150°C. 
  4. In the meantime, soften the bicarb soda to remove any lumps, and set aside.  
  5. Prepare a tray lined with paper or a silpat to prevent the honeycomb from setting.  
  6. When the sugar hits 150°C, add in the bicarb soda and mix it quickly.
  7. Watch the sugar react and rise up. Turn on the heat and give it another quick mix before spreading onto the tray and spread out to cool.  
  8.  Allow to rest without moving for at least an hour to allow to harden.  
  9.  When hardened and set, use a back of a knife to hit It and watch it crack.   
  10. Pack away and use as required.

Tips

  • Melt some chocolate and coat the honeycomb.  
  • To store for a longer period, put in an airtight container or in the freezer. 
  • You can switch the glucose syrup for golden syrup for a darker colour and deeper caramel flavour.  
  • If the flavour is too bitter for you, cool it to a lower temperature the next round.  
  • Don’t be disappointed if your honeycomb is deflated. Keep trying and you will get the hang of it.  
  • The bigger pot is required to stop the overflow when the reaction happens with the bicarb soda.