Lemon Honey Throat Drops

I've been sick these last few days with a miserable sore throat and a stuffy nose.  It is awful.  I made my own throat drops instead of relying on Halls and they work fabulous.  They give me relief so I'm not constantly coughing.  You probably know that honey has great medicinal benefits for you, however, in this case it is really not about that.  In this recipe you have to bring the honey to a boiling point and when you do that you take out all the medicinal value of the honey.  It still has great flavor though and is very soothing.

You will need a half cup of honey, 2/3 cup of sugar (I used xylitol to help with my teeth) and 2 tablespoons of water.  You will also need the zest of one lemon.  Be sure when you are skinning the zest off that you only get the yellow lemon skin and not the white part of it because it will be bitter.

Mix the three ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a boil.  Remove from heat, cover the pan and wait until the mixture reaches about 265 degrees.  If you have a candy thermometer, great!  If not, you can look up how to do the cold water test, which is what I did.  I would recommend a candy thermometer as it is more accurate though.  Once it reaches this degree, remove the cover and allow it to cool down for about five minutes.  This will give the mixture time to thicken.

Drop dab of this mixture onto your wax paper and allow to cool and harden for about 20 minutes.  They turned out great and have a bit of a lemon and honey flavor to them.

Sorry about the poor image quality.  My kitchen lights burnt out so I had to make this under my microwave light and a lantern :)