When you stop by the honey aisle, the first thing that hits you is, “Wow, there’s a lot of this stuff.” At any given supermarket, you’re likely to see a dozen or more brands, each with different descriptions: “raw”, “pure”, “organic”, “unfiltered”, and so on. Right alongside them, you’ll see plain ol’ bear-bottle honey, as well as honey with practically no description at all.
You might start to wonder: does it matter which one I pick? Simply put: yes. And not just because of the taste. Without a careful look at the label, you might not even be buying honey!
It’s true: “Adulterated honey” is honey that has been mixed with some other substance; usually a similar, but cheaper, sweetener like corn syrup or sugar. Because of the significant amount of honey fraud around the world, many discount honeys are actually adulterated with who-knows-what and definitely not worth buying. Honey is the third-most-faked food in the world, behind milk and olive oil, according to compliance management company Decernis. There's no reason to think that fake or adulterated honey is a threat to public health, but it's still a problem.
Undercut by prices that can dip below half their operating costs, honey producers bear the economic brunt. "Adulterated or fake honey depresses the price for real honey, making honey production unprofitable," Kelvin Adee, president of the American Honey Producers Association, told Insider. "Beekeepers have to turn to other sources of income such as packing and retailing honey themselves, raising queens/hives for sale or pollination services. Honey production by itself is not a sustainable option."
Fake honey is bad for beekeepers and bad for bees
The exact amount of fake honey in the world is up for debate. An analysis by the Honey Authenticity Project, an association of activists and industry members, places the number of fake or adulterated honey at 33%. A 2018 study of honey for sale in Australia found that 27% of the products tested were faked or had other ingredients mixed in. US-specific numbers are harder to come by, but one lawyer, who's behind several class-action lawsuits accusing honey brands of fraud, puts the figure as high as 70%.
Since you’ll never see “unadulterated” or “adulterated” on a label, here are some tips to make sure you’re getting the good stuff.
Choose 100% U.S. Honey.
Honey fraud can happen anywhere, but it’s most common in honey imported from foreign countries. Often, there’s no way to know where honey is actually from once it’s imported. For instance, honey may be “laundered” by passing through a country to hide its actual origins and skirt regulations and tariffs. With 100% U.S. honey, you don’t have to worry about “honey laundering.” It’s much easier to keep honey under the watchful eye of the FDA.
Organic doesn’t always mean unadulterated.
There are many requirements for a food product to be certified organic, but the most common (and relevant to most people) is that it doesn’t contain pesticides. Since bees pollinate pretty much wherever they want and pesticides can be found all over the U.S., it’s all but impossible to produce organic honey in the U.S. Only very small amounts of USDA-certified organic honey are produced each year by bees on organic farms.
Some honey companies often get around this by selling honey that’s produced outside the US and certified organic by that country, but not by the USDA. This introduces the possibility that this foreign honey could be adulterated.
Look for raw & unfiltered honey.
Cloudy honey is more likely to be raw & unfiltered. Cheaper honeys are often superheated (pasteurized) into a consistent, clear, drizzly liquid. This may look nice on the shelf, but it ruins honey’s flavor, disguises where it’s from, and destroys the amino acids and minerals that make honey so much better than sugar. Cloudiness is a great sign that your honey hasn’t been mishandled, and you’ll definitely taste the difference. Be skeptical of any honey label that claims to have “100% pure honey.” When you buy honey from a supermarket you really don't know what you are getting- where it came from, what was added, what was taken away or how it was processed. The only way to know your honey is natural is to buy it directly from the bee keeper.
The honey in our bottles isn’t just 100% natural honey. It’s raw & unfiltered 100% U.S. honey produced from our own hives right here on our property in Paradise, TX. Our honey comes straight out of the hive and into the jar, just like nature intended. Nothing is added and nothing is taken away.