Raw Honey FAQ

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beekeeping, raw honey

I know this but after an evening answering questions at a local famer’s market I decided I needed as refresher on Raw Honey myself – just in case I was omitting some points. I found the following on a blog called Honey Traveler.

Raw honey is honey that is unheated and minimally processed. It is pure honey where nothing has been added or removed. To be raw, honey should not be heated above temperatures one would normal find in a hive (approximately 95 degrees F). Additionally it should not be ultra-finely filtered to the point of removing pollen and organic materials that are an intrinsic constituent of honey.

Unheated, “raw” honey contains all the vital ingredients that give it its healthful properties and wonderful aroma. Most commercial honey you see in supermarkets is not raw honey. This mass produced honey is often heated to temperatures far above the normal temperatures of the bee hive. Heating past the maximum hive temperature of 95 degrees Fahrenheit changes honey’s essential composition and degrades its quality. It partially destroys honey’s beneficial enzymes and ‘boils off’ volatile compounds that account for the unique, delicate floral aroma of the honey. This is done to make it easier to extract from the honey comb, to filter it, to package it, to ‘pasteurize’ it to kill benign yeast and prevent fermentation and to delay crystallization.

Micro-filtering also degrades the healthful properties of honey by removing beneficial pollen residue. Much commercial honey is micro-filtered, often using a diatomaceous earth (DE) process to eliminate even micron-sized particles. Why go to these lengths when a relatively coarse strain would result in a clear, visually beautiful product and not remove healthful pollen? The reason is to slow down the naturally occurring crystallization of honey. Tiny particles act as ‘seeds’ for the crystallization process, by removing them with micro-filtering, crystallization is delayed.

But crystallization is not a problem to be solved. Almost all honeys crystallize after time. It is actually a good sign the honey is raw. To re-liquify, simply heat the honey jar in warm water (104 F, 40 C) until it returns to the liquid state, stir occasionally to transfer heat, and replace the hot water if needed. Note some honeys will not crystallize easily because of low glucose levels and in these cases, this is not a sign of heating or micro-filtering (ex. honeydews, black locust-acacia, tupelo, sourwood, sunflower, sage).

A good trick to ensure you are getting raw, unprocessed honey is to purchase it in the comb.

Health Benefits of Honey Negatively Affected by Heating

Many of the healthful organic compounds and substances in honey are destroyed or inhibited by heat.

Antibacterial, Antimicrobial Properties from Enzymes in Raw Honey:
The main enzymes in honey are invertase (saccharase) diastase (amylase) which break down sugars and help digestion. The enzyme glucose oxidase produces the antibacterial, antimicrobial hydrogen peroxide, a well-known disinfectant.

Antioxidant Properties in Raw Honey:
Dependent upon enzymes and a wide range of compounds in honey, antioxidants are substances that can retard or inhibit oxidation and/or neutralize the effects of damaging “free radicals”. Increasing the body’s antioxidant content may help protect against cellular damage and the development of chronic diseases.

From the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 2002, Vol. 50, No. 21, pp.5870-5877:
“…Antioxidant analysis of the different honey fractions suggested that the water-soluble fraction contained most of the antioxidant components, including protein; gluconic acid; ascorbic acid; hydroxymethylfuraldehyde; and the combined activities of the enzymes glucose oxidase, catalase and peroxidase. Of these components, a significant correlation could be established only between protein content and oxygen radical absorbance capacity ORAC activity (R(2) = 0.674, p = 0.024). These results suggest that the antioxidant capacity of honey is a product of the combined activity of a wide range of compounds including phenolics, peptides, organic acids, enzymes, Maillard reaction products, and possibly other minor components…”

Other antioxidants include polyphenols, flanonoids and phenolic acid in Raw Honey. Polyphenols in foods are thought to play important roles in human health such as cancer preventative, and anti-inflammatory, radical scavenging and antioxidative activities. The most important classes of antioxidant polyphenols are the flavonoids and phenolic acids. It is these substances in honey, wine, fruits and vegetables that are most responsible for the antioxidant characteristics, and thus the healthy image of these foods.

Darker honeys like Buckwheat honey are stronger antioxidants compared to lighter honeys.

Source: http://www.honeytraveler.com/types-of-honey/raw-honey/

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Ginger Honey Pear Butter by Fillmore Container

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ginger, honey, honey recipe, pears, raw honey, recipe

Ginger Honey Pear Butter

September is National Honey Month and it seemed fitting for us to celebrate. Not only because we have a pretty sweet line of honey jars, but also because we’ve been enjoying honey sweetened preserves and all the benefits of swapping honey for sugar in our jams, fruit butters and other preserves.

If you haven’t tried using honey in place of sugar in your preserves, this post about honey sweetened preserves offers some guidance on how to do that safely. We’ve also learned a lot about the addition of honey, and tried many trusted recipes from the books Naturally Sweet Food in Jars, and Preserving with Pomona’s Pectin.

GINGER HONEY PEAR BUTTER

This recipe is adapted from Marisa McClellan’s recipe for Gingery Fig Butter in her book Naturally Sweet Food in Jars.

Yield: 5 (half-pint/250 ml) jars

3 pounds/1.4 kg pears, chopped

1 cup/340 g honey

1/4 cup/60 ml bottled lemon juice

1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger

Prepare jars, lids and a boiling water bath canner and 5 half-pint/250 ml jars.

Note: You don’t need to peel these pears. The natural pectin in the skins helps thickening. And adds flavor and nutrition. When you puree the pears (with the skins), you’ll find the skins just disappear into the butter.

Combine the pears, honey, lemon juice, and ginger in a low, wide, non-reactive pot. Place over high heat and bring to a boil. Once the contents of the pot begin to bubble and roll, reduce the heat to medium-low. Using an immersion blender, puree the warm pears until smooth. Cook, stirring regularly until the pear puree is thick. You know it’s done because it begins to thickly coat the sides of the pan and offers more resistance when you stir. During cooking, the pear butter may have clumped up a bit. If this is the case, use your immersion blender to puree is smooth again.

Remove the pot from the heat and funnel the finished butter into the prepared jars, leaving 1/2 inch/12 mm of headspace. Wipe the rims, apply the lids and rings, and process in a boiling water bath canner for 15 minutes.

Ref.:

https://www.fillmorecontainer.com/blog/2018/09/20/ginger-honey-pear-butter/

Use Honey first for a cough, new guidelines say by Lytchett Bay Apiaries

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honey, honey for cough, raw honey

New guidelines for doctors from the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE) say they should tell patients to use honey first when they have a cough. This is based on 3 studies that showed honey reduces symptoms by 2 points on a 7 point scale.

Honey and over-the-counter medicines should be the first line of treatment for most people with coughs, new guidelines recommend.

Read full article here: Use Honey first for a cough, new guidelines say — Lytchett Bay Apiaries

Corn Fritters with Honey-Bacon Drizzle by christinanifong

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beekeeping, honey, honey recipe, raw honey, recipe

This summer, I became immersed in the world of honey. It began with my reporting on a magazine story about backyard beekeepers, which then led to lessons in how honey is made and why it’s been a treasured food for millennia. Did you know there are more than 300 documented varieties of honey in the US alone? Or that the University of California, Davis developed a tasting wheel to categorize the hundreds of flavors that can be detected in these many hues of honey? All this research, of course, ended up with me back in my kitchen, testing recipe after recipe. I write today to share this, my favorite new honey recipe. Think of these fritters as tasty, hearty hush puppies, good enough to make into a meal. The honey flavor is subtle, yet a perfect complement to the corn and pork.

Read entire article with recipe here: Corn Fritters with Honey-Bacon Drizzle —