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Maryam Mo posted in the group Agriculture
Honeybees are European, but we know that people in the Americas used honey in their food and drinks. The Mayans used it in a liqueur called xtabentún, for example, and a ceremonial drink called balché. In a question on r/AskFoodHistorians, u/planetnp reveals that people in what is now Mexico got their honey from the wasp Brachygastra mellifera, and u/Ignis_Vespa adds that the Mayans used a native bee called Melipona beecheii.As of now, there are plenty of organizations in the Yucatán Peninsula trying to bring back the consumption of Melipona honey, which is amazingly healthy and even used as medicine, but they’re fighting deforestation, industrial pig farms, other bees, pesticides, and the Mennonites’ illegal soy plantations.
