Dumping

Years ago there were ten times as many professional beekeepers in the industry. Honey prices were high and honest businesses only purchased honey from reliable sources. International markets, looking to drive down the number of beekeepers, dumped millions of gallons of honey throughout the 1980s and ’90s on the US market for less than the cost of production—a practice called economic dumping—in hopes of shrinking the honey business and affecting cascading markets.

It worked, and honey prices never fully recovered. Regulations have been put in place, but tons of internationally dumped honey still makes it into the US each year.

Blended Honey

Most of the honey you find on the shelf has a similar taste. Some of that is because clover honey is fairly uniform and widely produced. But there is a darker side to it.

Corn syrup and rice syrup retail for about 15 cents a pound. Unscrupulous farmers feed this to their bees, and it can still technically be called honey since the bees gather it. Some companies even blend it in after the fact and still sell it as honey.

Rice & Corn Honey

Single-source honey is pretty common on most mass-produced, reputable farms. Bees are parked on crop fields notorious for producing honey, and this is why most commercial honey tastes the same. It’s not an ethical issue—it’s just how it’s produced. More flowers means more honey, and when those plants are well-known honey producers, any beekeeper would put their hives there too.

The downside is you miss out on the unique nectars and pollen that are so beneficial for allergies. It’s not that single-source honey doesn’t contain varied pollen, but it typically isn’t the pollen that most allergy sufferers react to.

Crystallized Honey

Someone once said honey has to be crystallized to be real. This is not true. Whether honey crystallizes depends on the glucose-to-fructose ratio and whether crystal “seeds” (yes, seeds) exist in the honey or storage tank.

All plants that produce nectar have varying degrees of glucose and fructose. In our experience, there isn’t much correlation to color either—we have some pitch-black honey that is still liquid after 10 years, and some nearly clear honey that’s hard as a rock.

The science is straightforward: the higher the fructose content, the less likely the honey will crystallize. Honey without crystal seeds also takes much longer to crystallize. These seeds start the growth of crystals, which spread until the entire jar is solid.