Most honey sold in U.S. stores fails to meet standards

[58limited]

Good reason to buy from local sources. Also local honey is good for allergies. I've been making mead for awhile and I've noticed that store-bought honey just does not make a very good mead compared to minimally processed local and regional honeys.

 

"Most of the honey sold in chain stores across the country doesn't meet international quality standards for the sweet stuff, according to a Food Safety News analysis released this week..."

http://eatocracy.cnn.com/2011/11/09/most-honey-sold-in-u-s-grocery-stores-not-worthy-of-its-name/?hpt=hp_c3

 

[iheartmaytag]

I buy my Honey from a co-worker who's husband keeps the bees.  It's primo.

 

Have you ever read the ingredients of some of the store honey?  Some are cut with corn syrup, and are only "honey" flavored.

 

 

[norgeway]

I remember!

My Great Uncle keeping bees, Once in a while my Grandmother and I would go visit him as he was her brother, and he would be working in his bees, I was scared to death of them...and still am!, but I can remember how good that pure clear sourwood honey was, you cant get real sourwood much anymore..He never put on any protective clothing and hardly ever got stung!!

 

[henry200]

In addition to the national brands, Cub stores here carry honey produced locally.  That goes for maple syrup as well.  They also have locally grown fruits and vegetables in-season, and some of their stores have sizeable organic/natural food selections at better prices than Whole Foods. 

 

[tomturbomatic]

Sourwood trees are so beautiful when they bloom and the honey is the best. Friends used to belong to a beekeeping club and had all differnt types of honey, but sourwood was my favorite. A friend gave me some dark honey, not as bad as buckwheat, but dark and the honey cake I made was hardly sweet at all. Magazines and pamphlets published during WWII were full of recipes using honey as a way to get around the sugar rationing. With the bees becoming scarce, I would imagine honey is now very expensive which is probably why it is so adulterated in the mass markets.

 

[58limited]

I've never had sourwood honey, I'll have to look for it. There are dozens of varieties I've found on the internet, with highly variable prices. Since I make mead, I look for larger sizes - I use 15lbs for a 5 gallon batch, honey is about 12lbs/gallon. I've found one place that has bulk honey (5 gallon bucket) for $115, including orange blossom and other specific varieties. Other places on the web average about $150 for 5 gal, and one place wants $260!

 

In South Texas around Uvalde Haujillo honey is the king. I just bought a really rare one last week, not enough for a mead but will be great for holiday cooking: Indian Blanket honey. Indian Blanket is a native wildflower found in the plains states, it is also called Firewheel. Only one place has this honey and they don't have much. It is very light, sweet, and fruity - I like eating it straight.

 

[westie2]

Local unrefined Honey is also good to use to help with algeries.  A teaspoon a day is better than some medications.  My wife gets out honey from a co worker that has several hives.  My wife's brother used to have bees also but all his hives died out about 5 years ago.

 

[gizmo]

I don't know if Leatherwood honey is exported or not, but I love the stuff. It is grown only in Tasmania (Australia's island state) and has a strong characteristic taste. There is nothing else like it.

Oooh look, I have found a web page listing where it is available overseas.

this is the brand I eat. Yum!

R. Stephens Tasmanian Honey

www.leatherwoodhoney.com.au

 

[whirlcool]

We have a few bee keepers locally who sell their own honey in roadside stands. I've never visited them, but I may now. They have signs on the premises indicating that their honey is good for allergies because it has local pollen in it.

I was horrified to hear that some manufacturers are cutting their honey with "corn syrup" Does this equal HFCS? That crap is in almost everything!

 

[arbilab]

As I understand it, HFCS is just several percent more fructose than "plain old" corn syrup. The sweetener change happened about the same time (late 70s) as the proliferation of cans and I attributed the bad taste to the can but I was mistaken, bottled US Coke tastes just like the cans (rancid).

I tried to get Coke to explain why changing sweeteners bombed the whole character of the product, got the "thanks for your interest in Coca Cola products" form letter. We can buy Mexican Coke here (the drink, not the powder--well both actually but only comparing the drinks) and it tastes and even smells like Coke did when I was a kid but costs $1.30 a bottle. US Coke smells like drain cleaner. To the devil with Coke, Pepsi makes a US sugar formula for regular price, I drink about 4 cans a week.

Adulterating honey? Isn't that just wrong? Whirl, do you remember Burleson's honey? Local Texas product but in all the stores. Howzbout Falfurrias butter? I've actually BEEN TO Falfurrias. In the valley.

 

[58limited]

<a name="start_37375.555917">I was horrified to hear that some manufacturers are cutting their honey with "corn syrup"
</a>

 

I saw that when I was shopping for honey for a batch of mead awhile back - some products are labeled "Honey Flavored" instead of "Pure Honey." I started using some local wildflower honey and, as I said in my first post, my meads are turning out much better.

 

Arbilab - HEB carries Falfurrias butter - good stuff.  Burlesons is no longer a Texas product, but is still pure honey according to their website:

 

"<span id="dnn_ctr370_HtmlModule_HtmlModule_lblContent" class="Normal">Burleson’s creates special honey blends through computerized processing to ensure that the highest quality honey, with consistent taste and flavor, is delivered to your table. We shop the world over to ensure that only the best honeys available are put under the Burleson’s label. Our strict quality control checks ensure that every drop of Burleson’s honey is 100% pure."</span>

 

<span class="Normal">One problem with buying overseas honey is that it sometimes sits for a year or two, the quality degrades when it sits for more than a year.
</span>

 

[arbilab]

Thanks for the update 58. Many locals get swallowed by 'glomerates and cease to be local. Look what happened to Pace Picante and Dr Pepper!

BTW, the Dublin TX plant has always made the sugar formula. But like imported Coke, it costs over a dollar a bottle now.

 

[whirlcool]

Coke tried a fast one in 1985 with "New Coke"
The story goes as follows:

Coke wanted to make a cheaper product to boost profits. They saw that the price of cane sugar was increasing. So they tried making it with HFCS. They weren't happy with the results. They knew that people buying Coke wouldn't like it, especially if they had recently drank a real Coke. To Coke, profits were stronger than customer satisfaction.

So to clear people's pallets (and memory) of the taste of the original they rolled out New Coke. It tasted like crap and very few people liked it, just as Coke had predicted. BUT after 90 days with no original Coke around they said that "they gave in" and rolled out "Coke Classic" and said it's the same old Coke everyone is used to. Ha! It was the same formula, but with HFCS in it instead of cane sugar. Most people fell for it. A lot didn't. It was heavier, not refreshing
and left your mouth feeling syrupy after drinking it. But what I find interesting is that the United States is the only place where Coke is sold with HFCS. Coke manufactured in other countries is made with cane sugar, hence Mexican Coke.

We switched to Mexican Coke a few years ago. It is the Coke I remember as a kid.
Light and refreshing. And we lost a few pounds after switching to it too. Somehow we don't get hungry after drinking one like we used to. I don't know why Coke does this, there must be a reason?

 

[dirtybuck]

The "new" Sierra Mist is made with sugar and tastes pretty good. It's basically the only one I'll drink while at home.

I compared SM to 7Up and Sprite. SM tasted so much better.

 

[dirtybuck]

Sue Bee Honey

This is the one we used in our household when I was a kid.

According to the website, they also leave the pollen in.

Home

www.suebeehoney.com

 

[ptcruiser51]

Kosher Coca-Cola

Can often be found in your local supermarket around the time of Passover or Yom Kippur.  Just look for the distinctive yellow caps on bottles with Hebrew markings (I've never seen it in cans).  It's made with sugar instead of corn syrup. 

 

[arbilab]

Seems I misspoke about HFCS being only slightly higher in fructose than plain corn syrup. But it's not simple. The fructose is already there but it is bound to sucrose. Link below takes you to the process, 1/3 down the page. Doesn't sound particularly wholesome to me. No wonder strict Kosher rejects it.

Note that the Corn Sweetener Association blatantly lies in their commercials. They say, "Your body can't tell the difference". It most certainly can. Sucrose is absorbed directly, also triggers insulin. Fructose has to go to the liver to get taken apart and does not trigger insulin. In the absence of insulin the body does not set itself to metabolize sugar so it gets stored. Coincidence that the epidemic of obesity coincides exactly with the introduction of HFCS? Or that the rats used in acceptance testing became half-again their normal body weight? Or that the curve for diabetes matches the curve for HFCS market penetration?

Almost as bad as the subtstance and its effects is that HFCS is a product of corporate lobbying and government meddling in the economics of foodstuffs. Same meddling that transformed the entire Caribbean economy from "don't worry be happy" sugar farmers to thugs. If Jamaica ever gets nukes we might be in trouble, having earned their grudge.

High-fructose corn syrup - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[whirlcool]

And now the FDA is allowing manufacturers to call HFCS just plain "corn syrup". Of course you know why that is? Because there have been enough reports on HFCS to cause concern over food safety and long term health effects. So they'll just call it something else until it dawns on people what it really is.

If Coke is worried about the tariffs and taxes on Sugar, you know we grow it in the U.S. too. Or just move production to Mexico where such tariffs don't exist.

If they can make our washing machines in Mexico, they certainly can make our Coke there too.

 

[arbilab]

Gov't protects US sugar prices and prohibits imports, but at the same time there are very few remaining US growers. Only a few climates are suitable for it in the first place.

Whereas corn can grow juzbout anywhere, and that's who lobbied to make sugar prohibitively expensive for mass buyers like the softdrink industry. And gov't SUBSIDIZES corn, same lobby. Monsanto, Cargill, ADM. See also, the requirement that every US metro sell ethanol fuel. Same lobby, same questionable results. Even cars can't digest corn as a substitute without losing mileage.

So we can safely conclude the decision was purely economic, since we know CocaCola has little regard for product quality and absolutely none for the health of their customers.

The finished product and even the concentrate is too heavy (8#/gal) to be practically transported more than 100 miles. That's why Kansas City can't have Coke from Mexico and why there is a bottler/canner no less than every 100 miles. Purely economic. They aren't satisfied unless they make a dime for every gulp and they don't give a flying flarg what it ends up tasting like.