My terms are ones I have arrived at for my own learning and understanding. A technical terms describing the water attracting property of honey is 'hygroscopic'.
Hygroscopy is the ability of a substance to attract and hold water molecules from the surrounding environment through either absorption or adsorption with the absorbing or adsorbing material becoming physically 'changed,' somewhat: by an increase in volume, stickiness, or other physical characteristic of the material as water molecules become 'suspended' between the material's molecules in the process. (wikipedia)The practical application of these properties comes in learning to manipulate the textures of baked goods without non-pronounceable ingredients. This week I created a super-moist beer bread loaf that I called, "Everything But The Farmer".
It contained: organic whole wheat pastry flour, Oklahoma free range eggs, beer, olive oil, carrot juice, local honey, organic onions, flamingo peppers (from Tom @ Webb City Market), pecorino Romano cheese, Italian herb mix, pink sea saltWhat I learned was that I paired too many wet ingredients together without a drying ingredient and the result was even to the side of over moist. Cornmeal would have helped.
