Food

Bee Honey

I’ve been eating Honey almost every day for eight years now…

 

I do NOT buy Honey from regular stores!

 

Despite 8 years of eating it and the information below, I’m still not completely sure I’m buying the right Honey!

 

Almost all these years buying it only in a special.mullion store on Liteiny!

But even there, once, when I asked the saleswoman if there was a chance to buy a fake in this store, she replied, “can I not answer that question……….” I wasn’t surprised by the answer….

 

How to choose a good honey !!! ???

In the old days honey was boiled.

And today it is proven: honey is not just boiled, even heated can not!

 

It turns out that at temperatures above 50 degrees the lion’s share of its valuable properties is lost.

Unscrupulous sellers heat it anyway, so that it looks like freshly harvested honey.

 

– High-quality honey can never be clear. It always looks cloudy and, in most cases, glistens in the sun.

– The honey should be a slurry, viscous enough to wrap around a spoon. If a crater appears in the pouring, it means the honey is underripe, with more water than it should.

– If you take a drop of honey on your tongue, hold it to your palate, and wait a moment, you will get a burning sensation. This is the sign of good honey.

 

– Genuine honey has a distinctive, familiar smell. But counterfeit sugar solutions do not smell.

 

– Most often counterfeited popular types of honey – light and liquid consistency. Therefore it makes sense to buy dark and “saturated” (crystallized) honey – these varieties are less likely to be faked.

 

*** One “but”: Doctors do not recommend that children younger than 1.5 years be given honey. Otherwise, in their digestive system, it can become a breeding ground for botulism.

 

Finding quality honey on the shelves of stores and markets is not easy.

 

It’s hard to gather, and very easy to falsify: Chemical additives, molasses, simple sugar syrup, and even coarser ingredients like clay, chalk, and gypsum are all used.

 

So how can you tell the difference between a natural product and a fake?

 

Honey in a Jar

If honey is sold sealed, it is extremely difficult for the consumer to assess its quality. But you should not count on the honesty of the producers: There are some tricks to keep you out of trouble. Natural honey can be either liquid or crystallized (“shrunk”). Crystallization time depends on both the flowers you harvest and the temperature at which you stored the honey. Most honeys crystallize between November and December. When you buy candied honey, which is made up of tiny crystals and resembles clarified butter, you can be sure it’s real.

 

Liquid honey is a little trickier. Look closely, and you’ll notice bits of wax and pollen in real bee honey. And never buy honey if you see that the jar has two layers: a thicker layer on the bottom and a more liquid layer on top: this is a clear adulteration.

 

A few varieties of honey (heather, acacia and chestnut, which have more fructose than others) remain liquid until spring. Natural, liquid honey is rare in the middle of winter, so be careful when buying: you may be handed either artificial or sugary (derived from feeding the bees sugar), and most often – heat-treated. “Aged honey, heated to 40 degrees or more, becomes fluid again, but loses nearly all of its useful properties. And it has a sugary, caramel flavor.

Honey by weight

If you buy honey by the glass or by weight, gauging its quality is much easier.

 

Avoid the frozen honey, which looks like a monolith of frozen butter or lumps of sugar sorbet, and is hard to even cut with a knife. This is definitely not a product that was harvested this year, and maybe not even last year. What is wrong with this honey? Because it contains ingredients you don’t know about. The fact that the honey actively absorbs moisture and odors during storage. Where is the guarantee that it was stored in good conditions?

 

By the way, you can tell by the weight of the honey, how well it was stored, and whether it was diluted with water: a kilo of honey should fit into a jar of 0.8 liter (and if it doesn’t, it means that there is too much water in it).

 

The most important thing, however, is to taste the honey.

 

You should taste quality honey, which dissolves in your mouth evenly, without residue, and you shouldn’t leave any hard crystals or powdered sugar on your tongue. In addition, it is always a little tart and a little “itchy” in the throat.

 

But the therapeutic properties of honey (soothing in motherwort honey or anti-cold in raspberry and lime) can not be tested at the counter. But at home, after swallowing a certain amount of honey, you are sure to feel its effects: for example, from raspberry you will break out in a sweat; if this did not happen, then from raspberry in honey one name.

 

A few little tricks

Stir a tablespoon of honey in a glass of clean hot water. Honey without additional impurities will completely dissolve; if you then add a little alcohol, the solution will not muddy, remaining perfectly clear (the only exception in this case would be honey from conifers).

 

Another method is to sprinkle a drop of honey with a pinch of starch. If the starch stays on top of the yellow drop with a white cap, the honey is excellent; if it doesn’t, you’re looking at adulteration.

 

One last thing. Buy your honey from a producer beekeeper. Then you will know exactly on what land, in what month of summer or spring that amber treasure, which gives us health and pleasure, was collected.