Raw honey

[pargyle]

He checks our labeling on his yearly inspections. Approx 2 years ago he commented that he was happy with our labels, and then brought up his (and his departments) dislike of using "raw" in the description of the honey, saying that they are encouraging local beeks not to use the word. Apparently they were in discusion with other councils trading standards to prohibit the use of "raw" in the honey labels.. his comment was... if you class your honey as raw, you may be suggesting that other honeys have been "processed" in some way. When I was recently reported for adding sugar to my honey part of the complaint was that I had "reprocessed" the honey by adding sugars to it.

Strikes me there are some people in your neck of the woods that need to wind their neck in a bit and a Trading Standards department that has too much time on their hands .. those inspectors might be better off looking over their shoulders and wondering if their time is being spent effectively on public service ...

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/welsh-council-facing-35m-budget-27781462

 

[Antipodes]

unprocessed honey

What is unprocessed honey?

 

[pargyle]

What is unprocessed honey?

The better question to ask is what constitutes processed honey:
1. FIne filtered, under pressure, to remove pollen grains and wax particles that contribute to granulation.
2. Heated to temperatures that effectively pasteurise it - allowing it to remain in ungranulated state.
3. Blended with honey from multiple, unspecified, sources.
4. Any additional processing that detracts from the state that it comes out of the comb in.

 

[Antipodes]

There are good marketing and public perception reasons to seek to differentiate the untreated, unprocessed honey which most of us purport to sell from industrially processed, pasteurised and fine filtered stuff you will find sold in some places.

You can't define these things properly at present. You're likely to continually get tangled up in trying to as it needs proper legislation. I can't see that an approach of moving on and hoping the issue will go away will work that well.

Your response (as below) is clearly not an answer to the question I asked which is "what is unprocessed honey?"

"The better question to ask is what constitutes processed honey:
1. FIne filtered, under pressure, to remove pollen grains and wax particles that contribute to granulation.
2. Heated to temperatures that effectively pasteurise it - allowing it to remain in ungranulated state.
3. Blended with honey from multiple, unspecified, sources.
4. Any additional processing that detracts from the state that it comes out of the comb in."

 

[ericbeaumont]

strain my honey to remove wax cappings etc - that is filtering, just with a coarse filter.

In kitchen terminology, perhaps, but industrial filtering is on a different planet: diatomaceous earth is added to the honey, to which pollen and particles attach themselves.

High-pressure industrial filtration will not permit the DE+pollen to pass through, and what comes out of the other side is a cleansed product. I would expect that a significant loss of aroma would also result.

 

[Etton]

‘2. Heated to temperatures that effectively pasteurise it - allowing it to remain in ungranulated state.’
Does any one know to what temperature it is heated to then still called raw honey!

 

[Erichalfbee]

‘2. Heated to temperatures that effectively pasteurise it - allowing it to remain in ungranulated state.’
Does any one know to what temperature it is heated to then still called raw honey!

If you read there whole thread the conclusion is that there is no definition of raw honey. Hence............

 

[Erichalfbee]

Listen to Gruffydd Rees here

​

 

[The Poot]

Listen to Gruffydd Rees here

​

Almost two hours? I think not. Perhaps this evening in order to get a good nights sleep

 

[enrico]

What is unprocessed honey?

More to the point what is processed honey?

 

[Antipodes]

More to the point what is processed honey?

https://agriculture.vic.gov.au/biosecurity/moving-livestock-and-animals/moving-bees-interstate

"Processed honey is defined as; any honey that has undergone extraction, filtering to remove wax cappings and dead bees), decanting into clean containers and packaging in a facility which is inaccessible to bees".

 

[Erichalfbee]

I think not

I listened to first half hour. Some interesting points. Will do the rest in instalments

 

[user 819]

I always struggle to decide the best temperature for my cabinet; 42C for a shorter time or eg 38C for longer. Obviously the honey takes a while to reach those temperatures too.
42C could still be considered "higher than natural", though a bee in flight can be quite warm.

I set my st1000 stat to 37c for the initial warming of a tub , if I find it doesn't liquify then it goes up to 39c . 42c is only used on stubborn Glucose honies that remain unclear but runny. If it remains still unclear then it gets jarred and sold whenset at set honey.
I don't over filter and only use the coarse filter from the two piece kit to remove larger wax and any other bits that may be in honey during the extraction.

 

[pargyle]

https://agriculture.vic.gov.au/biosecurity/moving-livestock-and-animals/moving-bees-interstate

"Processed honey is defined as; any honey that has undergone extraction, filtering to remove wax cappings and dead bees), decanting into clean containers and packaging in a facility which is inaccessible to bees".

Well that's an Australian definition ... not sure the majority of UK beekeepers would agree with most of that ..if you don't extract the honey and jar it then how can it be sold ? A frame at a time for consumers or just cut comb - not a particularly appealing product for the greater majority of honey consumers ?

 

[pargyle]

Actually - your quoted definition is taken out of context ...Let's publish the whole paragraph for clarity

"Movement of honey and wax​

Whilst unprocessed honey and wax is subject to current movement restrictions, a permit is not required to move processed honey or wax into Victoria.

Processed honey is defined as; any honey that has undergone extraction, filtering to remove wax cappings and dead bees), decanting into clean containers and packaging in a facility which is inaccessible to bees.

Processed wax is defined as any wax that has undergone melting, filtering (to remove bees, brood, debris), rendering, packing into clean containers and packaging in a facility which is inaccessible to bees"

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Well that's an Australian definition ... not sure the majority of UK beekeepers would agree with most of that

and there you have it - who is to say what the definition of 'raw' or not should be? it seems there's a want to pick and chose to suit, and ignore the grey areas you are not comfortable with

Actually - your quoted definition is taken out of context

the context in this case doesn't matter - their definition of 'processed' would be the same across the board

 

[user 819]

For UK beekeepers unprocessed means minimal filtering and heating to keep debris out of the finished product. One coarse filtering at extraction in to storage buckets for excess honey and then minimal warming later to liquify to enable jarring up.
I have seen some Pakistan , Iranian and Turkish honey shown to me by various nationals from those countries and the final product looked very unappealing with lots of detritus in the honey . One could likely call it raw as one chews threw all the bits.

 

[pargyle]

and there you have it - who is to say what the definition of 'raw' or not should be? it seems there's a want to pick and chose to suit, and ignore the grey areas you are not comfortable with


the context in this case doesn't matter - their definition of 'processed' would be the same across the board

I'd agree with your comment about the definition - whether you choose to sit on the white or black side of grey is a personal decision. I don't have any strong view or desire to force people in either direction whilst there are still grey areas.

The context of the Australian definition does have a relevance as it is made within the context of the movement of unprocessed honey - but either way the definition relates to honey in Oz and has no relevance in the discussion about UK honey.

I'm not really in favour of over-regulation of anything - whilst I am not an anarchist I do feel that where there is micro-regulation either it is largely ignored or a massive, costly and usually inefficient Goverment department will be set up to enforce it - and the next stage is licensing with the inevitable fees required to fund the regulation.

I'm in favour of dog licences but they were abandoned because the cost of administering and enforcing (that was a joke) it far exceeded the revenue from the licence. With over regulation of beekeeping (as there is in some countries) we face the risk of licences to keep bees and a registration number that would need to go on your packaging ... it's a slippery slope.


https://www.google.com/search?clien...ate=ive&vld=cid:e5e79de4,vid:wOrJT-Q8CKE,st:0

 

[Wilco]

This debate about raw is a beekeeping irrelavance ..it's only amongst beekeepers that it is perpertuated - the public don't give a hoot about the legality, or not, as the case may be. They just see a term/description which means something to them and recognise the product for what it is. Quality honey that is neither blended nor unduly processed ... if you decry raw then, be warned, another word or phrase could replace it - be careful what you wish for,

The HLR is clearly not sufficiently definitive, as demonstrated by the Court case where the judge left an open goal. My view - those that want to describe their product as raw should be permitted to get on with it without the continual jibes and criticism from those who prefer not to. There are good marketing and public perception reasons to seek to differentiate the untreated, unprocessed honey which most of us purport to sell from industrially processed, pasteurised and fine filtered stuff you will find sold in some places. Until such time as a clear ruling is made (and that's not going to be any time soon) I can't see why some beekeepers are objecting ... if they fear that it's a slur on their product which is just labelled honey - if it matters that much - change your labels rather than seeking to make others conform to your perception of what the label should say.

It's a storm in a honey jar ...

Your penultimate sentence is basically 'other people shouldn't force me to change to the way that suits them and if they don't like it they should change to the way that suits me.'

Somewhat hypocritical IMO.

Honey regs are clear as to what constitutes honey and the concept of 'raw' is implicit. The issue is no-one is enforcing the labelling of baker's honey on heated honey and the various documents circulating about how to reliquify honey at various temperatures makes it worse. Raw is a superfluous word which aims to improve the user's sales by implicitly maligning any other honey not sold as raw. People can play linguistic twister as much as they like to try and justify it but I doubt they're even convincing themselves- it's all about profit. As has been pointed out in numerous other debates on here and is evidenced by this case, make use of raw common and the big corps. will start using it then another word will be needed and in time we'll need a full sentence to make honey stand out when 'honey' should be enough. My view is that use of raw is both foolish and selfish.

 

[Erichalfbee]

make use of raw common and the big corps. will start using it then another word will be needed and in time we'll need a full sentence to make honey stand out when 'honey' should be enough.

Which is exactly what will happen. Rowse took Hilltop to court when they started labelling their supermarket honey Raw and took sales away from Rowse. They had to back down and remove raw from their labels.
Give Raw shelf space and we will be in all sorts of trouble.