Not All Honey is Equal               

Honey is a miracle food, but not all honey products are equal.  Most consumers believe that honey is a natural product made by bees. Little do they know that to keep prices low, many commercial brands mix their honey with other less expensive cane, beet or corn sugars. These products are definitely sweet, but they are nothing more than health-destroying sugars in the same vein as white table sugar.

Honey should also, as defined by the Codex Alimentarius Commission which sets international food standards and trade, contain at least 95 percent bee pollen. Their Honey Standard specifies that no pollen or constituent particular to honey be removed except where its unavoidable when removing foreign matter. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration concurs, honey without bee pollen is not honey.

Why is bee pollen so important?  Besides the health benefits of bee pollen and other honey constituents, products devoid of bee pollen are impossible to trace. Not knowing the point-of-origin and floral source hinders the ability of agencies charged with securing food supply to judge the safety of these products.

According to a U.S. Food Safety News study of 60 jars of different honey products purchased across the United States, 76 percent of grocery store products were free of bee pollen. Honey products sampled from major drugstore chains were completely free of bee pollen, as were individual packaged servings.  Honey bought at farmers markets, co-ops, natural and health food stores did contain bee pollen with organic and raw honey products having the most bee pollen.

Consumers who buy honey for its nutritional benefits, distinguishing a health-promoting honey from a health-destroying sweet imitation is difficult. Harvested in countries where environmental pollution is rife, and crops are sprayed with pesticides and antibiotics on hives, these high fructose syrups are toxic in more ways than one.

When chloramphenicol-laced Chinese honey was found in the baked goods and jams of two well-known U.S. food brands by the U.S. FDA, ethical suppliers started testing their honey for antibiotics and other contaminants, and for purity.  What was revealed was frightening. Ultra-filtration, a process developed by the Chinese, removes bee pollen, creating a nutritionally dead product with a long shelf life.  Without bee pollen, this fake honey is impossible to trace as officials can’t ID the source.

Removing bee pollen benefits low cost and cheap honey. This undercuts local producers who have higher quality standards for honey and stricter regulatory controls. Consumers are starting to know the difference between real honey and fake honey.

Consumers are also becoming educated about the benefits of 100% pure unprocessed honey. They are supporting local beekeepers and local companies like NutraBee™ who offer 100% pure unprocessed Canadian honey. They want companies to guarantee their honey products to be free from chemical residue, heavy metals or other contaminants. Greater public awareness is also driving demand for raw honey as a healthy sweetener in all the foods they buy.

 

 

Honey Dictionary

Bee Friendly NutraBee

At NutraBee, we take pride in all our products, partnering with a 4th generation family of beekeepers who are dedicated to their craft. They produce a quality raw honey containing digestible carbohydrates, proteins, enzymes, 18 essential and nonessential amino acids, vitamins and minerals, and free radical fighting antioxidants.

Unlike many beekeepers, their honeybees are not used to pollinate sprayed orchards. As the ingredient in raw honey is flower nectar and pollen, the flora which bees feed on affects taste and colour.  Bees feeding on sprayed crops produce honey which contains pesticide residue you can taste. Our customers can taste the difference, which is why they buy NutraBee honey.

The apiary we source our honey is located in a clean pollution-free environment.  To get a quality raw honey, they let their bees forage over 850 acres of wildflowers, moving the hives to different locations which exposes the bees to a wide variety of flora.  They also produce a monoflora buckwheat honey which has a richer taste and is darker in colour than lighter coloured and lighter tasting wildflower honey.

The honey we use in all our products is unprocessed raw honey: no heat, no water, no ultra-filtration and no added high fructose corn syrups – just 100% pure unprocessed Canadian honey. You can see this in the texture of our honey which flows in a continuous stream down to the last drop in the bottle.  As our honey contains no additives, there is no hard gooey mass at the bottom of the jar.  And, as bees have not been exposed to pesticides, you will not taste pesticide residue in our honey.

Mrs.Bee's partnership with bees started with an accident. Today, her life is full and active.  And, while she has limited recollection of her children growing up, and her hearing is still compromised, she no longer suffer from chronic pain and depression.  "I feel blessed to have the support of my family and with the assistance of bees, help others regain their health".

I am passionate about bees. So much so that I am known as Mrs. Bee among friends and customers.  My guarantee to you is that NutraBee Pure Gourmet Honey Products contains 100% pure unprocessed Canadian honey made by well-tended bees, as nature intended. I am certain that once you taste the difference, no other honey will be on your table.