When I came into work this morning I found a little Christmas gift bag on my desk. It was from a coworker for whom I spent a lot of time and effort recently helping get ready for a big conference. A gift wasn’t necessary but it was appreciated.
Anyway, it consisted of a mug, some fancy cookies, an assortment of herbal teas and a box labeled “Stash Honey Sticks” containing twenty plastic tubes containing honey. The sticks are crimped and sealed on the ends. On the back it says “Simply pop open the ends to stir natural goodness into your tea”.
So, I tried holding an end one over my tea and squeezing it. Nothing. I tried the other end. Nothing. I tried squeezing one end and sliding my fingers towards the other. Again nothing.
Eventually I took a pair of scissors, snipped of a corner at one end and squeezed it into my tea. Problem solved, but was I missing something obvious?
Is there a way to “pop open the ends”? Was I just too timid out of fear of honey spraying all over my office? Or is this just an example of a product with stupid unworkable instructions?
Maybe they define “pop” as “open with scissors”.
I should add: (directed at the manufacturer, not my coworker) what’s wrong with a honey bear, or a jar? This is an example of a difficult to use product, with wasteful packaging, done that way simply to appear fancy and exclusive.
The tea, at least the one flavor I’ve tried so far, is very tasty, as is the honey.
I bought a bunch of these from a market one time, and wanted to walk around the market eating them. In theory, you can put one end between your teeth and slide some honey up to pop the end. Then you suck on the straw until the honey’s gone.
Not being a tea drinker, it never occurred to me to put the contents of the sticks in tea.
Anyway, even using my mouth was pretty hard on some sticks. Some popped right open. Some I had to chew on pretty vigorously to get the end open.
I think they pop open “in theory” but in reality you might have to get some scissors.
If you bend them in half the sides will split, but then you have the problem of honey oozing all over the place. Scissors are probably the easiest option.
Tthat’s why I buy my honey in a squeezie-bear, the way the bee gods intended
We sell HoneyStix (and Agave Stix) by a company called GloryBee at my store. They also say Squeeze End To Open. I don’t think I’ve ever been able to pop them open. I usually just use a scissors. Every time I’ve tried I end up squeezing so hard I feel like I’m either going to wind up with it everywhere or puncture my fingers.
No one is stopping you from eating the honey right out of the straw Do it!
BTW for anyone who is having a hard time imagining this…the ones I came across at the market were literally drinking straws with the ends “welded” shut. Like a plastic Pixie Stix.
I hope I’m not the only one who read the title and thought it had something to do with storing sports equipment (i.e., stashing hockey sticks.)
The honey sticks I have encountered could be opened by squeezing perpendicular to the crimp. If you intend to chomp down on one to open it, hold it so the crimp is vertical.
I’ve always loved honey sticks; my dad used to get them for me as a treat every time we went to the local co-op, even as a 5 year old kid, and I still get them whenever I go there (and they’re still in the exact same spot, in a plastic cup right at the checkout line.) I never even conceived of adding them to tea; for me they were always just a little candy-like snack.
The opening method is an issue though. I typically bit off the end, but it takes a bit of work and it’s really not easy to do. I’ve tried folding over one end and then squeezing (in an effort to burst the seam on the end of the plastic tube.) It works, but frequently shoots a load of honey in some random direction. Many are the times that I’ve wound up with honey in some unwanted place because of this method. If I have a knife on me, I’ll slice the end, but I don’t always have one. Biting the end off is my most common technique, though it requires some effort (gnaw on the corner until it breaks.)
Please remember that the honey-stick company is able to keep prices low by not adding an easy-open device to the plastic tube; doing this would surely drive the price up, and we wouldn’t be able to enjoy this treat for such an incredibly low price. So let’s count our blessings, ok?
Lighten up. I wasn’t really complaining. It’s quiet in the office today and the muse hit me while I was making tea. I don’t expect them to add an easy-open device. Maybe they should just change the instructions to "tear open with teeth"or “hack end off with butcher knife”.
But really, they’d save a lot more by just putting the stuff in a damned honey bear.
This… I’m shocked at the level of difficulty the others in this thread have encountered. The trick is to get the corners wedged in your molars, with the crimp vertical, and chomp straight down. You aren’t squeezing honey against the seam with outward pressure… you’re making the plastic flex in a way it can’t, thus popping open the rigid seam.
You know how the end is sealed so it makes a straight line? squeeze gently with your teeth or fingers so the pressure goes along the line, it pops the seam open.
Wrestlers love these, once they’ve made weight, you can get some energy. I’ve never seen them opened any way but a bite on the end and then a good twist.
Do it!