Al,
    I have been brewing for about seven years with several major
competition awards under my belt. That said:
    The sugars in raw honey are nearly 100% fermantable. The effect of
adding raw honey to wort and adding hearty yeast is to significantly raise
the alcohol content and and increase the apparent "dry" mouthfeel and
taste of the beer/wine. As such, in order to keep the yeast from stressing
you may want to add some yeast nutrient to your  wort.
    You can affect the amount of fermentable sugar in the honey by
carmelizing the honey prior to adding it to your wort. To do this, in a
seperate operation from your wort boil, heat the undiluted honey in a
clean pot on your stovetop to about 200 or so Deg F. the exact temp is not
important and you can experiment. Be sure to stir regularly as the honey
will burn if not tended. Keep the honey hot for a while until you notice
it start to appear darker. This is the beginiing of the Carmelization
process. Essentially it is the same as creating a Caramel grain. Add to
your sweet wort within the last couple of minutes of boil or later. You
must be careful not to scorch the sugars again, and boilovers. The honey
can be added directly to you carboy prior to or after your wort addition
if desired. You will not need to be concerned with wild yeasts and
contamination as the honey will be at a high temp for longer than 30
minutes. If you are nervous, just add it to your boil just before
transfer.
    You can place the honey in your oven to make it easier to keep at temp
without having to adjust the burner on your stove. Continue until you get
the color you will come to associate with a particular flavor.
 
    The effect will be a varying degree ( depending on level of
caramelization) of red color (carmel makes beer red), head retention (due
to addition of residual sugars), apparent sweetness, and an apparent
caramel flavor, occaisionally a detectable honey odor (if a large amount
is used). Drawback may be a cold haze developed due to addition of
proteins.
 
    Honey with the addition of yeast nutrient is a great yeast starter.
This is a good use of honey acquired from the solar melter.
 
Thom Bradley
Chesapeake, VA
 
 
AL wrote:
 
> As I experiment with various homebrew recipes I wonder what effect
> adding a little honey for might have. The corn sugar, malt extract and
> other ingredients provide the fermentables, so the honey is begin
> considered from the flavoring aspect.
>
> AL