raw honey on a retail shelf

The Ultimate Honey FAQ: Your Top Questions, Answered

Honey is an almost magical elixir — sweet, natural and complex while simultaneously full of health benefits. This isn’t typical for most sweet foods, so it’s little wonder that honey provokes so many questions. Here are some of the most common honey queries, along with their answers.

1. Can honey go bad?

Honey doesn’t spoil. For starters, it has an acidic pH, which makes it inhospitable for bacteria to grow in. This, coupled with its low moisture content and natural antimicrobial and antibacterial properties, means honey can last almost indefinitely — as long as it’s stored properly.

To keep your honey from spoiling, store it somewhere dry, keep it well sealed, and use a clean spoon to avoid contaminating it. You should also avoid adding water to your honey or boiling it as you may spur fermentation. You’ll know this has happened if your honey smells like alcohol or foams. Outside of this, there’s not much you need to do to keep your honey fresh indefinitely — though it’s unlikely to last that long.

2. How is honey made?

The step-by-step process of how bees turn flower nectar into golden superfood is pretty amazing. To start, the bees flit from flower to flower to collect nectar, the sugary liquid that forms honey’s base.

Once the bee collects enough nectar, it’s time to return to the hive. There, the bee mixes the collected nectar with their saliva or regurgitates it into another bee’s mouth to do the same. 

After the mixture of nectar and bee saliva is combined, it’s deposited into a honeycomb cell. However, the liquid isn’t just left to its own devices. A troupe of worker bees are tasked with fanning their wings over the mixture to help evaporate some of its moisture and to thicken it. Once it reaches the right consistency, the bees seal the cells with beeswax where it remains until the hive needs it or the honey producer collects it.

3. Why does honey crystalize?

For most foods, a change in texture means it’s gone off — think the cucumber that liquifies in your crisper or the baguette that turns into a rock. However, that's not the case when it comes to honey.

Honey contains the sugars glucose and fructose in a solution with minimal moisture levels. Over time, these sugars begin to separate from the water in the honey and crystallize. Temperature fluctuations, especially cooling the honey, speed up this process. So, to put it off, store your honey between 18-24°C (around room temperature).

All honey crystallizes eventually, but processed honey generally keeps longer than raw honey. This is because filtering removes the beneficial ingredients in honey like pollen and propolis (which can speed up the crystallization process) and pasteurization neutralizes many of its nutrients and enzymes. As a result, raw honey often crystallizes a little more quickly than the processed version. However, its health benefits more than make up for this.

4. Can you freeze honey?

Yes, like other liquids, honey is freezable. However, those who remember the frozen honey Tik Tok craze from a few years back will remember that while it can be done, there’s no real need to do it. If you store your honey properly — inside a tightly sealed jar in a dry place —  it can last just about indefinitely.

If you choose to freeze honey anyway, you’ll want to follow a couple of guidelines. First off, use a freezer-safe container with a tight-fitting lid and remember to leave room for expansion.

When you’re ready to use the honey, you can thaw it out at room temperature, or in a bowl of warm water (for more on this see #7). However, you’ll want to avoid freezing and thawing it repeatedly as over time, it can affect the flavour and texture of the honey.

5. What is creamed honey and how is it made?

Creamed honey is a delicious way of preparing the golden superfood by making it thicker and easier to spread. Here at Kinghaven Farms, we introduce a small amount of creamed honey to a batch of pure honey. This serves as seed honey and as the mixture is stirred, it causes the rest of the honey to crystallize. The end result is a creamy, airy, whipped honey that’s perfect for spreading on everything from cheese to pancakes.

6. How does honey help a sore throat?

If you're in the habit of soothing a sore throat with a spoonful of honey instead of cold medication, you’re on to something. 

While honey is naturally smooth, its soothing texture isn’t the only thing at work. Honey has natural anti-inflammatory properties which may help to reduce the inflammation that causes throat irritation caused by colds. In addition, its natural antibacterial and antimicrobial properties may even help to shorten the duration of your illness by a day or two.

In fact, honey has been shown to outperform over-the-counter (OTC) cough and cold remedies when it comes to soothing a sore throat. So the next time you have a cough or cold, it’s worth reaching for the jar of honey for safe, effective, and oh-so-delicious relief from your symptoms.

7. What do you do if your honey crystalizes?

If your honey crystallizes, the first thing you should know is not to worry. Crystallization is a natural process and doesn't mean the honey has gone bad.

That being said, the texture may not be to your liking. To reverse the crystallization process, heat your honey’s container in a bowl of hot, but not boiling water. Once it’s warmed, gently stir the honey to help dissolve the crystals and return your honey to its liquid state.

8. How do you substitute honey for sugar?

While both are sweet, honey is healthier than sugar. Because of that, substituting sugar with honey is a great way to make your favourite sweet treats that much healthier. The trick is getting the honey to sugar conversion ratio just right.

To begin, because honey is actually sweeter than sugar, you’ll only need ⅔ of a cup of it for every one cup of sugar your recipe calls for. And, since honey is a liquid, you’ll need to reduce the amount of liquid elsewhere in the recipe by about a quarter cup. You’ll also want to lower the baking temperature by 25°F as honey-baked goods achieve a toasted golden colour sooner.

Finally, as weird as it may seem, honey is an acid. If your recipe calls for applesauce, buttermilk, or lemon juice, balance out the extra acidity by adding a Âź tsp of baking soda to the mix.

9. Can you give honey to babies?

Honey is delicious, and it’s normal to want to share something you love with the people you love. While this is usually fine, there is an exception. Children under one should never be given honey. While it’s quite rare, honey can carry the spores of Clostridium botulinum, a bacteria that causes a rare form of food poisoning called infant botulism.

Unfortunately, this applies to both raw and unpasteurized honey since the heat treatment of the pasteurization process doesn’t affect the spores of Clostridium botulinum.

So how come everyone over the age of 12 months can happily indulge in a spoonful of honey while babies can’t? Because, by the age of one, the gut of a child has been colonized with helpful bacteria that protect against Clostridium botulinum. Come their first birthday, honey can happily be added to their diet without issue.

10. Can dogs have honey?

You may love chocolate and grapes, but both have the potential to make your four-legged friends sick — sometimes critically so. Luckily, honey doesn’t fall into the same category. It’s safe for dogs, but with some caveats.

Like all foods, honey contains calories. As a result, you’ll want to limit the amount you give your dog as you would other treats. Secondly, while honey is far healthier than sugar, it is a sweetener and, like humans, dogs can get cavities. To reduce their risk of developing one, it’s a good idea to give their teeth a good brushing anytime they eat honey.  

11. How is honey good for health?

A number of studies have looked at the health benefits of honey.  Some claims are tantalizing — for example, that honey might provide a level of protection against Alzheimer’s disease or that it may be helpful as an adjunct treatment for cancer. While these theories still require more research, honey does have other well studied health effects.

Perhaps most famously, honey has natural antibacterial and antimicrobial properties that make it excellent for treating wounds. However, if you’re not up to wiping some honey on your next cut, try adding a teaspoon of it to your diet instead the next time you’re out with a viral illness instead. Ingesting a small amount of honey may shorten the duration of your symptoms by a day or two.

In addition, honey contains prebiotics which help to balance the populations of beneficial bacteria in the gut and help to ease digestive issues. Since serotonin and other neurotransmitters are made by bacteria in your digestive system, pure raw honey can also impact your mood, potentially decreasing depression and anxiety.

The benefits don’t stop there. Flavonoid-containing foods like honey can improve blood vessel dilation and also help to stop cholesterol in your blood from oxidizing and forming plaque build-ups in your arteries. Additionally, these compounds thin your blood to reduce your risk of clots. Since these properties help to ease the flow of blood throughout your body, it’s worth considering honey as a good addition to a heart-healthy diet.

Honey is also a phytoestrogen, which means that it mimics the effects of the hormone estrogen in the body. This may lead to countering some of the more pernicious effects associated with perimenopause, such as boosting concentration and memory. All in all, this makes adding honey to your diet a delicious no-brainer.

12. Is honey bee vomit?

Grossed out by the thought that you’re spreading “bee saliva” on your toast or drizzling it over your pancakes? While it’s true that bees collect nectar in their mouths, it goes into a specialized pouch called a crop which is connected to, but separate from, their stomach. Once they’re back at the hive they regurgitate this nectar and mix it with their saliva which contains special enzymes.

This potent combination of nutrient-dense plant-based nectar and bee salivary enzymes is backed by more than 100 million years of evolution. The end result? A delicious and nutritious superfood that’s good for you and doesn’t spoil. If that’s not natural magic, we don’t know what is.

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