One day at the market we had an opportunity to take home honeydew melon at bargain prices. Having experience choosing the sweetest watermelon using the “bee sting” method we decided to apply that logic to picking the best honeydew melon as well. So we set out selecting the melons, not by size, but by how bee kissed or marked up they were.
Step 1: Follow the Bees or Bee Tracks for the Sweetest Honeydew Melons
The “rough tracks” on honeydew include a lot of raised striations and lines. You can feel them when running your hand across the melon which occurs sporadically all over the honeydew. They are kind of brownish tan in color. (Note: Not all of the bee tracks are raised, some are just flat tan markings.)
As with watermelon the bees do not mark up the entire melon so do not fret if that is what you find. The important thing is to choose the honeydew with the most “bee stings” (markings and raised striations) as you can. (Notice how our honeydew in our photographs shows the markings on mostly one side, and this was a yummy, sweet melon 🙂 ).
Step 2: Additional Signs
A creamy yellow color is a good sign of a ripened honeydew. These melons also soften as they become more ripe. That’s what Chinese Grandma said.
From personal experience we would listen to the bees ourselves.
For it turned out the melons with the “rough tracks,” ( bee stings, bee kisses or whatever you’d like to call them), the ones that were all marked up & scarred, were the sweetest tasting honeydews of them all.
P.S. We always knew that elephants love watermelon. We agree they are the best but maybe they have never tasted the bee stung sweetness of a great honeydew melon.
And speaking of elephants, please remember that our elephants are an endangered species. Help save our elephants in captivity as well as advocating for elephant conservation in the wild.
For there cannot be a world without elephants.
Images: honeydew melon, © Elephant Spoken Here; CCFlickr by amy z pachyderm pack enjoying their fruits and veggies in Thailand pic 1 & pic 2
