The very first thing anyone says when they taste real, untreated, unheated, unadulterated honey made from what the bees bring in is how different it tastes. Like a garden grown, sun-drenched tomato instead of the insipid things masquerading as produce in many grocery stores, real honey is rich and flavorful with a whole host of sensory delights.
Each jar of real honey tastes different season-to-season depending on the weather and what the bees are foraging on. For this reason I can say that a jar of my Beach Blossom Honey extracted in May will be different from what you will get at the Fourth of July. It is unique. Much like an exclusive small press of grapes that becomes a once-in-a-lifetime bottle of wine. In fact, some beeks hold honey tastings to compare the various tastes, among other sensory features.
What you are buying off the grocery store shelf may be far removed from real honey, adulterated with antibiotics, heavy metals, leads and other banned substances. Much of the unsafe honey flooding the US is coming in large drums from Asia - it has been banned in Europe.
Andrew Schneider writing for Food Safety News, "Asian Honey, Banned in Europe, Is Flooding U.S. Grocery Shelves," reports on an investigation that has documented that "millions of pounds of honey banned as unsafe in dozens of countries are being imported and sold here in record quantities." Excerpt.
"Experts interviewed by Food Safety News say some of the largest and most long-established U.S. honey packers are knowingly buying mislabeled, transshipped or possibly altered honey so they can sell it cheaper than those companies who demand safety, quality and rigorously inspected honey.
"It's no secret that the honey smuggling is being driven by money, the desire to save a couple of pennies a pound," said Richard Adee, who is the Washington Legislative Chairman of the American Honey Producers Association.
"These big packers are still using imported honey of uncertain safety that they know is illegal because they know their chances of getting caught are slim," Adee said.
Food safety investigators from the European Union barred all shipments of honey from India because of the presence of lead and illegal animal antibiotics. Further, they found an even larger amount of honey apparently had been concocted without the help of bees, made from artificial sweeteners and then extensively filtered to remove any proof of contaminants or adulteration or indications of precisely where the honey actually originated.
An examination of international and government shipping tallies, customs documents and interviews with some of North America's top honey importers and brokers documented the rampant honey laundering and that a record amount of the Chinese honey was being purchased by major U.S. packers."
What does that mean for you? "Honey" is found in many products: salad dressing, breakfast cereal, bakery products, processed foods, and the like. You could be eating this junk even if you are not buying "honey" off the shelf.
The FDA knows about adulterated honey. The FDA knows other countries have banned "honey" from Asia and India. Why is the US a dumping ground? Excerpt.
"Much of this questionable honey was officially banned beginning June 2010 by the 27 countries of the European Union and others. But on this side of the ocean, the FDA checks few of the thousands of shipments arriving through 22 American ports each year.
According to FDA data, between January and June, just 24 honey shipments were stopped from entering the country. The agency declined to say how many loads are inspected and by whom.
However, during that same period, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that almost 43 million pounds of honey entered the U.S. Of that, the Department of Commerce said 37.7 million pounds came from India, the same honey that is banned in the EU because it contained animal medicine and lead and lacked the proper paperwork to prove it didn't come from China.
"There are still millions of pounds of transshipped Chinese honey coming in the U.S. and it's all coming now from India and Vietnam and everybody in the industry knows that," said Elise Gagnon, president of Odem International, a worldwide trading house that specializes in bulk raw honey.
The FDA says it has regulations prohibiting foods banned in other countries from entering the U.S. However, the agency said last month that it "would not know about honey that has been banned from other countries ..."
Adee called the FDA's response "absurd." He said the European ban against Indian honey is far from a secret.
"Why are we the dumping ground of the world for something that's banned in all these other countries?" asked Adee, who, with 80,000 bee colonies in five states, is the country's largest honey producer."
Know where your honey comes from. Excerpt.
"Import Genius, a private shipping intelligence service, searched its databases of all U.S. Customs import data for Food Safety News and provided a telling breakdown:
- The U.S. imported 208 million pounds of honey over the past 18 months.
- About 48 million pounds came from trusted and usually reliable suppliers in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Uruguay and Mexico.
- Almost 60 percent of what was imported - 123 million pounds - came from Asian countries - traditional laundering points for Chinese honey. This included 45 million pounds from India alone.
"This should be a red flag to FDA and the federal investigators. India doesn't have anywhere near the capacity - enough bees - to produce 45 million pounds of honey. It has to come from China," said Adee, who also is a past president of the American Honey Producers Association."
Know what makes adulterated honey dangerous. Excerpt.
"Chinese honeymakers began using various illegal methods to conceal the origin of their honey beginning in about 2001. That's when the U.S. Commerce Department imposed a stiff tariff - as much as $1.20 a pound -- on Chinese honey to dissuade that country from dumping its dirt-cheap product on the American market and forcing hundreds of U.S. beekeepers out of the business.
About the same time, Chinese beekeepers saw a bacterial epidemic of foulbrood disease race through their hives at wildfire speed, killing tens of millions of bees. They fought the disease with several Indian-made animal antibiotics, including chloramphenicol. Medical researchers found that children given chloramphenicol as an antibiotic are susceptible to DNA damage and carcinogenicity. Soon after, the FDA banned its presence in food.
"We need imported honey in this country. But, what we don't need is circumvented honey, honey that is mislabeled as to country of origin, honey that is contaminated with antibiotics or heavy metal," said Ronald Phipps, co-chairman of the International Committee for Promotion of Honey and Health and head of the major honey brokerage firm CPNA International."
Check out the beekeepers in your community. Buy from those who sell untreated (no Apistan, Fumigard, antibiotics, and the like), unheated (it breaks down the healthy enzymes), raw honey. Don't be fooled if someone says their honey is "organic". Currently, the US has no standards for organic honey, unlike produce, dairy and the like. Many beeks sell what we call "treatment-free" honey. If the seller is not the beekeeper, ask where the honey comes from and what they know about its source.
Be willing to pay for a good healthy local product - a heck of a lot of work goes into a pound jar of honey. Each honey bee contributes less than 1/2 teaspoon to the collective amount in her short lifetime. The work I do to keep them healthy, disease-free, warm, dry, fed and watered before I can rob some of their honey pales in comparison to the miracle they pull off.
