A GUIDE TO HONEY IN PORTUGAL: FROM THE MAINLAND TO THE AZORES

The introduction of sugar into the Portuguese economy and kitchens, back during the Age of Explorations in the 16th century, revolutionized our confections. But, until that point, our life was plenty sweet thanks to honey. In fact, the same applied to the rest of Europe, where sweetness and fragrance, in desserts or otherwise, was achieved thanks to bees, by using what is actually one of the oldest foods known to humanity.

A brief history of honey in Portugal

The origins of honey consumption in the region date back at least to the Neolithic period, as evidenced by ceramic vessels bearing traces of beeswax found in Iberian archaeological sites. But it was with the arrival of the Phoenicians and, later, the Romans, that beekeeping (apicultura) truly took off on Portuguese soil. The Latin word for honey, mel, is the exact same in Portuguese. But, curiously, it also lives in the names of towns like Melgaço in northern Portugal, likerally “place of honey”, more popular today for its crisp green wine than for the sweet nectar.

The Romans, who were present in Lusitania from the 2nd century BCE until the 5th century, were especially fond of honey. They used it not just as a sweetener, but also as a preservative, a fermenting agent, and a base for sauces and drinks. Mulsum, a kind of honey wine, was a favorite during fancy banquets. We might have had honey before the Romans came to the Iberian Peninsula, sure. But it was them who brought structured apiculture, including clay hives and specialized tools, many of which influenced traditional Portuguese beekeeping methods still in use in remote parts of the country until today.

During the Islamic period in the south of Portugal, particularly in the Algarve and Alentejo, Arab agricultural texts detailed sophisticated beekeeping techniques. The Moors introduced advanced irrigation, new crops, and knowledge about aromatic plants like lavender, rosemary, and thyme. These herbs still play a starring role in the flavor profiles of Portuguese honeys today.

In medieval Portugal, honey was a staple, but also a status symbol. Monasteries were major centers of beekeeping, producing honey and wax not just for the consumption by monks, but also for trade and liturgical use. Wax candles were a precious commodity in churches, and honey was used to sweeten herbal infusions, conserve fruits, and glaze meats. Honey even appeared in medieval recipes of mead (hidromel), one of the oldest alcoholic drinks in Europe and still produced artisanally in parts of Portugal today. If you’d like to get your hands on some hidromel while in Lisbon, we recommend visiting the store Apiagro – O Mundo do Mel (Avenida Guerra Junqueiro, 22A), where you can purchase Lu Citanea Portuguese mead.

After the 16th century, when sugarcane was brought into Europe via Portugal’s Atlantic colonies (first Madeira, and then Brazil), sugar quickly became king, especially among the elite. Yet in rural areas, honey remained the most common sweetener for everyday life. In mountain villages where sugar was expensive or simply unavailable, honey continued to sweeten porridges, preserve fruits, and serve as both ingredient and medicine.

Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, beekeeping in Portugal remained mostly a small scale, subsistence activity. Hives were kept in stone enclosures or rustic cork bark containers, and passed down through families. With the rise of industrial agriculture in the 20th century, some traditional methods started to become less common, but they never disappeared entirely. And today, a new generation of beekeepers, many of them working organically or even regeneratively, is bringing back this ancient practice, producing high quality raw honeys that reflect their region’s unique flora and climate.

With Portugal’s wildly diverse geography, shifting from sunny Mediterranean to humid Atlantic, the country is home to a variety of microclimates and endemic plants that make each honey distinct. Think dark, nutty chestnut honey from the north, delicate rosemary honey from the Alentejo, or intense, mineral rich heather honey from the Azores, just to name a few.

Fast forward to modern Portugal, and you’ll find that while sugar is certainly more prevalent, honey still holds a privileged spot in the national pantry. What’s changed is the awareness of its quality and origin. With growing interest in sustainability, slow food, and farm-to-table practices, Portuguese honey is experiencing a bit of a revival, and we’re certainly here for it!

Honey in Portuguese folk medicine

Just like it happens in several parts of the world, the association of honey with health and spirituality here in Portugal also runs deep. Traditional Portuguese folk medicine attributed healing powers to honey, from soothing sore throats and healing wounds, to improving digestion and promoting longevity. Honey has for many years been seen as medicine as much as it’s perceived as food and, for some, it is (or at least has been) even a symbol of abundance.

For many centuries, in rural Portugal, honey was a kind of edible medicine. This clearly shows how deeply connected people once were to nature, the seasons and the land itself. As everywhere else, honey’s most common use was to soothe throats and to calm coughs. A warm mixture of honey and lemon was (and still is) a standard grandmother approved remedy for a sore throat and, in some regions, it’s not unheard of to add a drop of aguardente, that is, Portuguese firewater, to make the “medicine” more powerful.

In central regions like Beira Interior, honey mixed with red wine and cinnamon was a home cure for chest colds and chills, especially in older generations. In Madeira and the Azores, locals would brew dried herbs, such as mint, lemon balm or thyme, in boiling water and stir in honey as both a sweetener and a fortifying agent. The honey was thought to help “fix” the plant’s properties in the body, making the infusion even more effective.

Beyond cold remedies, honey featured in home cures for digestive discomfort, insomnia, low energy, or general malaise. A blend of raw honey and bee pollen, for example, was used as a natural energy booster. So what’s today marketed as a superfood, was once just a part of everyday rural life.

The use of propolis, a resinous substance bees collect from tree buds, is another fascinating detail. In villages throughout Trás-os-Montes and northern Portugal, older generations still use homemade propolis tincture for mouth ulcers, sore gums, and earaches. Bee pollen was collected and sold in markets long before it became trendy in smoothie bowls.

Culturally, bees were seen as sacred, and hives were respected as living symbols of productivity and harmony with nature. In some rural parts of Portugal, especially in Minho and certain areas of Trás-os-Montes, it was customary to whisper to the bees when someone died as they were also perceived as members of the community. Overall, beekeeping was often a family legacy, passed down across generations, with traditional knowledge preserved in oral storytelling and seasonal rituals tied to the flowering calendar.

You’ll still see echoes of these traditions at local fairs, where vendors sell raw honey, and usually also pollen, wax, propolis tinctures, and sometimes even mead. Folk medicine may not be as visible today, but in many corners of Portugal, it still (more) quietly co-exists with modern life.

Uses of honey in the Portuguese kitchen

While sugar clearly dominates modern baking, honey remains an essential ingredient in traditional Portuguese cooking, especially when we look at recipes that originated and still matter outside the big cities.

In the north of mainland Portugal, honey is most often baked into dense, spiced pastries that appear at Christmas and other holidays. Broinhas de mel, typical in regions like Minho and Trás-os-Montes, are small cookie-like cakes made with flour, honey, olive oil, citrus zest, and warming spices. These cakes that aren’t overly sweet, are rustic and nourishing, made for sharing during winter gatherings. In Beira Baixa, spiced cookies are prepared with lard, honey, cinnamon, and aniseed, based on recipes that have changed little over the last century. These sweets are linked to religious holidays and agricultural calendars, especially in areas where honey was traditionally easier to access than refined sugar.

In Alentejo, honey plays an important role in balancing the richness of pork. It’s often used as a glaze for oven roasted ribs or pork loin, typically with rosemary or thyme honey (mel de rosmaninho), which complements the meat’s fat. Some families even add a spoon of honey to the finishing sauce of game dishes like rabbit or wild boar, especially when cooked in wine, adding a subtle layer of sweetness that makes the dish more balanced.

In regions that produce a lot of dairy, cheese and honey is a common pairing. In the Douro Valley and central Portugal, fresh cheeses like queijo fresco or requeijão are customarily served with a drizzle of honey, sometimes even with some crushed walnuts. The honey used is almost always from a known source, such as a family beekeeper, a neighbor, or a local cooperative, and its floral notes change dramatically depending on the village, season, and dominant plants. These combinations end up expressing the local taste, in the sense that we could argue that, just like it happens with wine, the flavor profile of honey also depends on its terroir.

While honey cake (bolo de mel) is best known from Madeira, there are also Azorean versions, especially on Pico. On this island they often use bee honey instead of sugarcane molasses. Local recipes highlight how the islands adapted this tradition using their own honey, which happens to have a distinctively strong flavor due to the volcanic soil and endemic plants. Bees forage on wild heather (urze), mint, and other native herbs, producing honey that is darker, more intense, and slightly mineral.

The Azores also have a tradition of using honey in queijadas, small cheese tarts typically made with local fresh cow’s milk cheese, egg yolks, lemon peel, and island honey. These aren’t commercial products you will usually find in tourist shops, as they’re mostly homebaked specialties to eat with the family and, at the most, which may appear at local religious celebrations with the community.

Honey is also featured in Portuguese drinks, such as poncha, a traditional sugarcane spirit-based cocktail popular in Madeira. In rural Portugal and across the islands, it’s common to find artisanal herbal liqueurs sweetened with honey and infused with mint, lemon balm, or fennel. There’s no specific recipe for these drinks, as it’s more about habit and making use of what the land nearby provides.

While supermarket honey is certainly available all across the country, many people still buy honey the old-fashioned way, that is, directly from the person who harvested it or, at the most, from small markets where it’s easy to trace its origin. This is the direct connection between the food, the land and the producers, that we aim at exploring in our Portuguese food and cultural trips, such as the experience Beekeeper for a day: honey tour in Pico island [inserir link para pagina da experiencia].

Regional honeys of Portugal

What’s fascinating about Portuguese honey is how it changes character from region to region, shaped by the plants the bees feed on. Here are a few varieties to keep an eye out for:

– Rosemary honey (mel de rosmaninho): predominantly from the Alentejo and central regions, this light and floral honey is one of Portugal’s most famous sweet nectars. It’s smooth, mild, and incredibly versatile.

– Eucalyptus honey (mel de eucalipto): commonly produced in central and coastal Portugal, particularly in areas like Leiria or parts of Ribatejo. It has a warm amber color and a slightly medicinal, mentholated aroma, making it ideal for tea or as a natural remedy for colds.

– Orange blossom honey (mel de laranjeira): typical of the Algarve and the Ribatejo region, this honey is pale in color and beautifully fragrant, with delicate floral and citrus notes. It’s one of the most aromatic honeys in Portugal and especially lovely in desserts or spooned over fresh cheeses.

– Chestnut honey (mel de castanheiro): found in Trás-os-Montes and the mountainous north, this one is dark, intense, and slightly bitter, and we think it’s perfect for cheese pairings or baking.

– Heather honey (mel de urze): a wild honey collected in highlands like Serra da Estrela and also in the Azores. Rich, mineral, and almost malty. If you’re into beer, you could think of it almost as like the stout of the honey world.

– Wildflower honey (mel multifloral, also known as mel de milflores): found all over the country, but especially in areas which are rich in terms of biodiversity, like the Algarve or the Beiras. This one varies a lot seasonally, as the bees will feed on whatever is blooming on a given place and time.

Many of these honeys are certified with DOP (Protected Designation of Origin) or other regional quality labels. That’s because the bees are sourcing nectar from local flora, often untouched by pesticides, in small traditional settings. Some of Portugal’s most acclaimed PDO honeys include Mel da Serra da Lousã DOP (a deep dark variety from the mountains by the same name), Mel de Barroso DOP (exclusively produced by the local bee species apis mellífera), Mel do Parque Natural Montesinho DOP (from the mountains that belong to Montesinho natural park), and Mel dos Açores DOP (which is a type of centrifuged honey, harvested from the nectar of incense and various wildflowers), amongst a few others.

On the mainland, the northern regions like Trás-os-Montes and the Serra da Estrela mountains are known for their dark, robust chestnut honey. With a slightly bitter edge and earthy aroma, this honey is dense and flavorful, often paired with sharp cheeses or stirred into game dishes. In central Portugal, particularly the Beiras, wildflower honeys dominate, being lighter in color and varying in flavor depending on what’s blooming that season. Further south, in the plains of the Alentejo, you’ll find one of Portugal’s most iconic honeys, mel de rosmaninho, made from rosemary blossoms. It’s delicately floral and used in everything from marinades to baked sweets.

But it’s when you cross the Atlantic and reach the archipelago of the Azores that things start to get even more interesting. The honey there is wilder, more fragrant, and more mineral. Because of the isolation of the islands, the bees feed on endemic plants that don’t exist anywhere else in the world, including native mint species, Azorean heather, volcanic myrtle, and even the occasional orange blossom in lower altitudes. The result is honey that’s layered, aromatic, and with a distinct local flavor profile.

On Pico Island, the honey carries the unmistakable signature of the volcano. The island’s rugged topography creates microclimates that shift dramatically between sea level and the mountain. Heather (urze), which grows abundantly on the slopes, gives Pico honey a darker tone and an intense herbal depth. The bees also collect nectar from other native plants that flourish in the island’s basaltic soil, which seems to concentrate aroma and color into the honey they produce. Even within the island, the flavor can vary depending on altitude and what’s blooming at the time of harvest. And because the production is artisanal and often seasonal, what you taste on Pico can never be exactly replicated elsewhere. While honey from Pico doesn’t yet hold a DOP label like other regional Portuguese honeys, it enjoys a growing reputation, thanks to its boldness and authenticity. Producers here still rely on traditional methods, often working organically and without industrial filtration or pasteurization. It’s honey the way it’s always been: raw, unprocessed, and packed with the flavors of the place!

As mentioned above, you can of course buy honey at the regular supermarket. But keep in mind that much of what you see in the average aisle has been pasteurized, filtered, and often blended from different sources. That honey is a world apart from the raw, unprocessed, artisanal varieties you can get directly from producers. Raw Portuguese honey is unfiltered and unheated, retaining all its natural enzymes and flavor nuances. It crystallizes (which is a sign of authenticity, and certainly not a flaw!) and tells you a story about the plants and land it came from. It’s real food, produced sustainably, without chemical intervention, in sync with nature.

From hive to table: visiting honey producers in Portugal

One of the most memorable ways to understand honey is to meet the people, and the bees, behind it. Across Portugal, and increasingly in the Azores, independent beekeepers are opening their doors to visitors who want to see the process up close. These are not factory operations, but family-run apiaries, often in beautiful rural settings, where visitors can learn firsthand about hive health, the impact of seasonal changes on honey harvesting, and the role that bees play in maintaining biodiversity.

A visit usually begins with a bit of background which will allow you to start understanding what makes this honey different from the one in the next valley over, how the landscape and plant life shape the flavor, and how the beekeeper manages their hives without disrupting the ecosystem. Visitors often get the chance to put on a protective suit and step right up to the hives, watching the bees at work, identifying the queen, and seeing how pollen and nectar are gathered and stored. There’s something unexpectedly hypnotic about the hum of a healthy hive, especially when surrounded by the scent of wildflowers.

The highlight of these farm experiences is, of course, the honey tasting. Raw honey, just harvested, has an intensity of flavor that no jar on a shelf can match. Often, tastings are paired with other local products, such as cheeses, fresh bread and herbal teas, and become a small feast that celebrates the region. These slow travel experiences are of course delicious, but also deeply educational, offering a rare look into the world of sustainable food production and the ways that bees, plants, people and the place are all connected.

On Pico Island, we offer a honey tour that brings you face-to-face with the island’s unique apiary traditions. In the company of a passionate local beekeeper, you’ll learn about the endemic flowers that flavor the honey, the volcanic terrain that gives it character, and the sustainable methods used to keep this practice alive. During this farm experience you’ll get to visit the hives, see how the honey is extracted and, of course, taste it as fresh as it gets!

In a world full of artificial sweeteners and superficial flavors, it’s worth remembering the old Portuguese saying: nem tudo o que é doce é mel, that is, “not everything that’s sweet is honey”. True honey carries a sense of place, the work of the bees, and the hands of those who care for the land. That’s the kind of sweetness that we hope to share with you when you visit us here in Portugal and in the Azorean island of Pico!

Article by :

Sílvia Olivença (anthropologist and food guide/CEO at Oh! My Cod Ethnographic Food Tours & Trips)

Zara Quiroga (freelance food writer and food & cultural leader at Oh! My Cod Pico Trips)