Real honey at RHS Wisley,

[ericbeaumont]

A search for honey on Charlie's website threw up walking boots and place-mats so I guess honey is not a serious stock item, especially as they don't appear to sell food.
Price = £3.33/lb so the Welsh beekeeper must be getting about £2.20/lb if Charlie's ask for 30% discount; they may demand more!

Bigger picture is far better: compare the dire exchange above with Aberystwyth beekeeper Tomos Jones, who sells Mel Afan Honey at a decent £6.99/340; mind you, it's packaged well (with no puff words): compare the label with the creaking and ancient Thorne version sitting next to it.

More examples of proper packaging at proper prices: Afon Mel at New Quay, Ceredigion, sell Welsh Wildflower Honey at £6.50/340 (and make a Heather Honey Mead which I would very much like to try). Here's Cardigan Bay Honey, selling similar honey at £8.50/lb and Ross Round combs at £14 for 8oz, and here's Wenallt Hive selling Honey with Pollen (compare with post No1) at £9/340; notice that the label states correctly Welsh Honey & Pollen. More here.

What this suggests to me is that Charlie's Cheap Honey may well be an anomaly which could be found anywhere (I recall the story of a Maldon, Essex, market where a beekeeper was selling at £2.20ish/lb). If only someone could have a kindly word with the Welsh beekeeper who supplied Charlie's, and suggest a better way to get rid of that precious stock...

 

[Erichalfbee]

If only someone could have a kindly word with the Welsh beekeeper who supplied Charlie's, and suggest a better way to get rid of that precious stock...

Hilltop

 

[ericbeaumont]

Hilltop

Out of the frying pan?

 

[Amari]

So, here for starters….
"Honey" is a high carbohydrate partially-dehydrated substance produced by honey bees (AMM) from nectar secreted by diverse forms of flora".
Anything else is not honey.
The elephant in the room is that low cost rubbish simply IS NOT HONEY.

That excludes pine honey then?
In Turkey and doubtless elsewhere hives are placed in coniferous forests and the honey is assumed to be honeydew ie the secretion of aphids. It tastes like honey and is delicious!
Conifers are not floral, they don't have nectaries.

 

[Ian123]

No pine honey aphid poop or honey due is included

 

[Amari]

No pine honey aphid poop or honey due is included

??

 

[Beefriendly]

??

Yes, all accounted for in The 2015 Honey Regulations, see section 2:1 below.

Definition of “honey” and different types of honey
2.—(1) In these Regulations “honey” means the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants or from secretions of living parts of plants or excretions of plant-sucking insects on the living parts of plants which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature.

 

[Madge]

Editing my reply as Beefriendly has just posted the definition of honey. Popporand's definition was incomplete.

I'll add:

13.—(1) A person trading in a honeydew honey must use the name “honey” or “honeydew honey”
in trade as the name of the product.

 

[Amari]

Many thanks Ian, Beefriendly and Mellifera Crofter

 

[charlievictorbravo]

The problem here is that Trading Standards are so obsessed with the exact meaning of the words "pure" and "raw" that they have failed to state in the regulations and rules what the word "honey" actually means. So as there is no definition the packers and resellers are at liberty to put whatever inside the jar they can get away with because they are not infringing any regulations.

This is a farce.

So, here for starters….

"Honey" is a high carbohydrate partially-dehydrated substance produced by honey bees (AMM) from nectar secreted by diverse forms of flora".

Anything else is not honey.

So it is not appropriate to label as honey any substance that contains carbohydrates not derived from nectar AND not processed by honey bees.

If trading standards followed this simple guide all the adulterated own label rubbish on the shelves would disappear overnight.

If they want to go on further and put in place additional restrictions about antibiotics etc, that is another matter.

The elephant in the room is that low cost rubbish simply IS NOT HONEY.

I'm sorry but the Trading Standards people have a perfectly adequate definition of honey set out in the Honey Regulations 2015 - In these Regulations “honey” means the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants or from secretions of living parts of plants or excretions of plant-sucking insects on the living parts of plants which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature. The difficulty the TS Officers have is determining what, if anything have been added to make honey not natural. It involves checking pollen in honey and doing detailed chemical analysis to try to find if rice syrup or corn syrup or anything else has been added.
I heard an amusing story but I don't know how true it is. Apparently the US Department of Agriculture was really pleased that the Chinese government had allowed the importation of several tens of thousands of US corn syrup. It took the US several years to establish that the honey they were importing from China largely consisted of the corn syrup they'd exported there. As I have said, I don't know how true it is but it does illustrate the problems associated with checking a honey's provenance.

In the above definition of honey, the word natural is used. To describe honey on a label as natural is tautology. If it's honey, it must be natural, by definition!

CVB

 

[Repwoc]

... definition of honey set out in the Honey Regulations 2015 - In these Regulations “honey” means the natural sweet substance produced by Apis mellifera bees from the nectar of plants or from secretions of living parts of plants or excretions of plant-sucking insects on the living parts of plants which the bees collect, transform by combining with specific substances of their own, deposit, dehydrate, store and leave in honeycombs to ripen and mature.

It's a pity they didn't include pollen as a necessary constituent in floral honeys. That would make it more difficult to hide the origin of honey by filtration.

The difficulty the TS Officers have is determining what, if anything have been added to make honey not natural. It involves checking pollen in honey and doing detailed chemical analysis to try to find if rice syrup or corn syrup or anything else has been added.

TS just need to get one of these:

https://www.bruker.com/products/mr/...MIo9Dv6J6w5wIVjbHtCh2eDQLREAAYASAAEgL5hfD_BwE

Bruker is the leading global NMR company.

 

[ericbeaumont]

The problem here is that Trading Standards are so obsessed with the exact meaning of the words "pure" and "raw"

If only they were; the BeeCraft article suggested otherwise:

Unknown to most beekeepers, in September 2017, a voluntary group (the Food Standards and Labelling Focus Group) of the Association of Chief Trading Standards Officers (ACTSO), representing senior trading standards managers from across England and Wales, issued ‘technical guidance’ about raw honey. Their guidance was for trading standards officers and specifically not for producers because interpretation and implementation are devolved to the local council trading standards. In England and Wales, trading standards officers may interpret and implement the guidance as they see fit. (my bold).

What floppy advice! Gives them free rein to do nothing! (In reality, to be fair, they probably have more significant issues to regulate).

 

[charlievictorbravo]

It's a pity they didn't include pollen as a necessary constituent in floral honeys. That would make it more difficult to hide the origin of honey by filtration.



TS just need to get one of these:

https://www.bruker.com/products/mr/...MIo9Dv6J6w5wIVjbHtCh2eDQLREAAYASAAEgL5hfD_BwE

Bruker is the leading global NMR company.

I looked at Bruker's website but I could not decide if they were selling kit or a screening service. Either way, it looked expensive judging by the number of people in white coats. If they are selling the kit, it begs the question whether ISO 17025 accreditation is needed to obtain results that could be used in a prosecution. What is needed is just one high profile (Sainsbury, Morrisons, Asda, Tesco, Aldi etc.) prosecution for retailers to get cold feet about selling cheap honey that may or may not be adulterated with something else.

In the meantime, the best defence against cheap imports is for UK beekeepers to be informative on their labels and describe where and how their honey is produced without using words like raw, pure, natural, etc. I know the use of these words is not illegal but in my view, they should be unnecessary.

CVB

 

[For want of a better word]

I looked at Bruker's website but I could not decide if they were selling kit or a screening service. Either way, it looked expensive judging by the number of people in white coats. If they are selling the kit, it begs the question whether ISO 17025 accreditation is needed to obtain results that could be used in a prosecution. What is needed is just one high profile (Sainsbury, Morrisons, Asda, Tesco, Aldi etc.) prosecution for retailers to get cold feet about selling cheap honey that may or may not be adulterated with something else.

In the meantime, the best defence against cheap imports is for UK beekeepers to be informative on their labels and describe where and how their honey is produced without using words like raw, pure, natural, etc. I know the use of these words is not illegal but in my view, they should be unnecessary.

CVB

Just put BEST honey and be done with it!!!

Chons da

 

[Repwoc]

I looked at Bruker's website but I could not decide if they were selling kit or a screening service. Either way, it looked expensive judging by the number of people in white coats.

They develop and sell the kit.

Yes, NMR machines are expensive. The one purchased by Bath Uni chemistry in 2014 when I was working there was over £1M. NMR machines are not cheap to run either - regular topping up with liquid helium and so on.

However, despite the high capital cost NMR machines are fairly common in UK university chemistry and pharmacy departments - there are six of them at Bath uni for example. TS therefore don't need to own one, just rent time on one. They would probably have to invest some cash in the food scanning specific stuff (eg the database and software) but I imagine that would be more affordable than the entire kit and caboodle.

As you say, once it became known that spotting fake honey was routinely possible the purveyors would probably think on it a bit more.

 

[enrico]

Just put BEST honey and be done with it!!!

Chons da

Surely that should say 'probably the best'

 

[charlievictorbravo]

Surely that should say 'probably the best'

No - that's only for Danish honey!

CVB

 

[For want of a better word]

No - that's only for Danish honey!

CVB

 

[Tonyatcwfarm]

Any scientific research done comparing re liquified honey and crystallised honey from the same batch ?
Just curious if taste or consistency is altered

 

[Ian123]

Any scientific research done comparing re liquified honey and crystallised honey from the same batch ?
Just curious if taste or consistency is altered

If treated with care I would suggest none or very little as some appears on show benches annually.