Whats Wrong With My Honey?

[ponderingturtle]

ETA: On the antibacterial properties of honey -- I was just watching animal heroes on animal planet, and the veterinary hospital was using honey on bandages instead of a commercial antibacterial ointment. And then I saw this thread. Fun coincidence!

In the interest of honeys anti bacterial properties, in Good Eats, Alton Brown says that when honey crystalizes it can dilute the honey enough that it can support mold and other bad organisism as it does not have enough sugar in it to kill them.

 

[ponderingturtle]

So, what do you mean by processing, and is there evidence that it "negates many of the properties"?

Processing uses CHEMICALS and chemicals kill the magic.

 

[tesscaline]

In the interest of honeys anti bacterial properties, in Good Eats, Alton Brown says that when honey crystalizes it can dilute the honey enough that it can support mold and other bad organisism as it does not have enough sugar in it to kill them.

As much as I like Alton Brown, I'd rather have a different source for that kind of information as I've personally found quite a few errors in his shows.

 

[ponderingturtle]

As much as I like Alton Brown, I'd rather have a different source for that kind of information as I've personally found quite a few errors in his shows.

Interesting, I would like to know what the errors were. He seems to put an emphasis on the science, but as Shirley Corriher, was not on that episode, it might not have had the science checking that it could.

But I found this

The second process that can affect the quality of your creamed honey is fermentation. All honeys contain sugar-tolerant yeasts that can cause them to ferment or spoil if their moisture content is too high. The moisture content of well-ripened honey is 18.6%, or less, and this suppresses the growth of the yeasts. Honeys with higher water content are susceptible to fermentation, and considerable loss from fermentation occurs during years when bees are having difficulty ripening their product. Crystallization and fermentation are closely related. During crystallization, the glucose molecules separate from the liquid phase as solid glucose hydrate crystals containing 9.09 % water. Since liquid honey is generally between 17 and 19% water, crystallization frees up quite a bit of water and that increases the moisture content of the remaining honey. This creates an environment favorable for the growth of the yeast. Even well ripened honeys may ferment if they crystallize

Bee Keeping site link

I will see if On Food and Cooking or Cookwise say anything on this.

 

[CORed]

Honey often contains aphid poo.

Aphid poo in my bee puke! Yuck!

 

[tesscaline]

Interesting, I would like to know what the errors were. He seems to put an emphasis on the science, but as Shirley Corriher, was not on that episode, it might not have had the science checking that it could.

Most of the errors are small, and could just be a side effect of oversimplification for television. They also mostly took place during the first season, so perhaps he didn't have enough of a budget for fact checking at that point. There are also the cooking technique faux pas which have a tendency to bug me more because of my culinary background -- like using a chef's knife to cut parchment paper (big no no. My instructors would have had my head if they caught me doing that).

But I found this

Bee Keeping site link

I will see if On Food and Cooking or Cookwise say anything on this.

See, I'm not entirely sure that fermentation is quite the same as harboring molds and other "bad" organisms. After all, fermentation is a fairly important part of making mead (amongst other alcoholic beverages), and doesn't automatically equate to something becoming infested with nasties.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Most of the errors are small, and could just be a side effect of oversimplification for television. They also mostly took place during the first season, so perhaps he didn't have enough of a budget for fact checking at that point. There are also the cooking technique faux pas which have a tendency to bug me more because of my culinary background -- like using a chef's knife to cut parchment paper (big no no. My instructors would have had my head if they caught me doing that).

Makes sense, the first season is rougher than the others. I am not sure Alton is a skeptic either, as W is played by his chiropracter.

He is weird with knives as well, as he says people shouldn't sharpen them themselves.

See, I'm not entirely sure that fermentation is quite the same as harboring molds and other "bad" organisms. After all, fermentation is a fairly important part of making mead (amongst other alcoholic beverages), and doesn't automatically equate to something becoming infested with nasties.

It counts as going bad though. I am not sure if it was just yeast as is mentioned there, or also mold.

I learned about mold and sugar syrups the hard way with some maple syrup.

 

[JJM]

From the reading that might not be a bad sign. {snip} Gentle heating to hive temps can liquify without destroying the enzymes and other biologicals.

So I've read.

A glass jar full in the dish washer does a terrific job for me.

Where did you read that? Is the stuff coming out of your dishwasher really at the hive temp.?

 

[krazyKemist]

Maple syrup rules.

hear, hear !

Another reason why pasteurised honey might (hypothetically; we'd have to verify if that is the case) crystallize faster might also have to do with protein denaturation.

Some proteins have the capacity to inhibit or modify crystal-forming processes. I remember one conference on the subject of one such protein which hibernating frogs produce to avoid cell damage caused by freezing. Such a protein might be useful to the bees in order to avoid sugar crystallisation in their own hives.

Heating up the stuff might actually make it worse, since repeated healing/cooling (what is called "annealing") favorises the formation of crystals (more energy for nucleation). Especially if cooling is slow, which will afford bigger crystals. Rapid cooling will block the stuff in an amorphous phase.

 

[macdoc]

Which may be why some freeze honey.

Honey is amazing in it's ability to crawl around and into crevices - must be some capillary aspect.
We had our honey stored on the top shelf and some jars expanded and the honey dripped down onto some hard drives in plastic cases.

Damn stuff crawled into the cases and onto the drives even tho they were flat stacked.

 

[EHocking]

Strange that an urban myth is so well analyzed.


http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=14940519

No indication which of the possible contaminating factors, "packing, contact materials, imported production" contributed to their detectable levels in "a few" samples from the 107. So you can't actually use that one Japanese study to say just where the contamination comes from, nor whether the <5% of the samples that PBA was detected in was terribly significant.

and Beehive makes a point of promoting BPA free.

Where there's panic there's money.

Over blown concern? perhaps.

Urban myth?? not at all.

The urban myth is your conflation of PBA studies in honey and presuming that heating a squeeze bottle would leach it out.
You seem to have ignored the point that soft plastics do not have PBA in them.

There is no similar problem with glass.

Well, you're wrong about glass containers as well. From the Canadian Governments Final Screening Assessment,
"Epoxy resins made with bisphenol A are commonly used in protective coatings..., Epoxy-phenolic resins are used ...as coatings on metal lids for glass jars and bottles, as well as..."

 

[to.by]

The plants the honey comes from has a marked influence on the consistency of the honey. Honey from heather is usually quite thick, almost like peanut butter. I does not flow at all. Honey from some other flowers is almost as thin and flowing as maple syrup.

 

[macdoc]

The urban myth is your conflation of PBA studies in honey and presuming that heating a squeeze bottle would leach it out.
You seem to have ignored the point that soft plastics do not have PBA in them.

Speaking of conflation - would you like to point out where I made that leap

The point being that there is enough concern to do a scientific study to examine the packaging through out the food chain for honey.
I also said glass, not coated glass.

•••
JJM
Hive temperatures are not room temperature

The average hive temperature is 93.5 degrees.

- raw honey is not liquid at normal room temp, the apiary page suggested "gentle heating" to stay within bounds for preserving active biologicals. I suspect a beekeeper knows her work. Mine does.

I've no such urge to "gentle heating" and stick it in the dish washer and it stays liquid for a couple of months.

Conflating dishwasher temp and hive temp is entirely your own leap.

 

[EHocking]

Quote:
The urban myth is your conflation of PBA studies in honey and presuming that heating a squeeze bottle would leach it out.
You seem to have ignored the point that soft plastics do not have PBA in them.

Speaking of conflation - would you like to point out where I made that leap

Post 47 : "Bisphenol A is likely in the squeeze bottles - glass rules for microwave."

The point being that there is enough concern to do a scientific study to examine the packaging through out the food chain for honey.

Moving the goal posts there, we were discussing a particular container type, not the "through out[sic] the food chain for honey".

I also said glass, not coated glass.

And that's why my post addressed glass, not coated glass;

"Well, you're wrong about glass containers as well. From the Canadian Governments Final Screening Assessment,
"Epoxy resins made with bisphenol A are commonly used in protective coatings..., Epoxy-phenolic resins are used ...as coatings on metal lids for glass jars and bottles, as well as..."

 

[krazyKemist]

Just to add on the subject of BPA:

It's present mainly in polycarbonate plastic (if you look on the container you'll see "PC" in the little recycling symbol). Of which are notably made rigid sports nalgene bottles and baby milk bottles.

I also want to mention that BPA is only weakly estrogenic compared with endogenous (produced within the body) estrogens such as estrone and estradiol. This means that for a healthy adult (one that is not on hormonal suppression treatment), its effect is negligible, on par with what can be found in many common foods like soy or yams.

I would be concerned only for :

- babies & prepubescent children
- women with breast, cervical or ovarian cancers which have been typed ER+, and/or are following an estrogen-suppression treatment for medical reasons

All in all, the most at risk of deleterious effects are babies because of the combination on low weight, low desirable estrogen dose and chronically high exposure through warm milk bottles.

Also, keep in mind that all types of containers will leak something in food, glass and metal included (remember when you threw out your aluminum cookwear ?), and that this something can have good or bad effects (ex.: steel cans will leak a certain quantity of iron into acidic liquids such as cola; whether this is good or bad depends on your genetics).

Conclusion : You can keep your sports nalgene bottles, just avoid heating up stuff in it. But you should avoid using those polycarbonate milk bottles to feed your baby.

 

[quarky]

Does anyone know if the 'honey' of ants that store honey in their extended gasters, is distinguishable from bee's honey?

Also,

Do you think you could swim in a pool full of honey?
Or would it drown you?

 

[krazyKemist]

The plants the honey comes from has a marked influence on the consistency of the honey. Honey from heather is usually quite thick, almost like peanut butter. I does not flow at all. Honey from some other flowers is almost as thin and flowing as maple syrup.

And some flowers give a very caracteristic taste and color to it. Buckwheat honey for example is dark (is some instances, almost molasses-like) and has a pretty different, marked taste.

You can also taste blueberry flower honey, which also has different caracteristics (darker, with a taste that almost but not quite reminds you of blueberries) compared with "classic" (ie, wildflower or clover) honey.

Maple syrup also varies hugely in taste and consistancy according to season and manufacturing process. Early maple syrup is pale gold, thick of consistancy, with a subtle taste (what they call "grade A"). Late maple syrup is dark, liquidy and more strongly sweet ("grades B & C"). Grade A is mostly sold fresh and locally directly from the producer. Grades B & C are used in maple-flavored products (and in one liquor that we make here in quebec).

It's quite difficult in my experience to get unadulterated (some add brown sugar in it), good maple syrup outside contact with a producer. My own contact producer is quite passionate, has a very small scale production and still uses the traditional wooden stove with basins for his production (can you imagine that wonderful smell in his wooden shack ?). He has conceeded to use modern vacuum tubing for collection.

 

[krazyKemist]

Do you think you could swim in a pool full of honey?
Or would it drown you?

I would not, for my part, try to swim in honey. Viscous and sticky liquids are already used by various carnivorous plants to trap & kill insects. That should tell you much about being able to swim in it, or just to maintain your head at the surface.

 

[casebro]

But you ought to float really high in honey, it is about 50% heavier than water.

 

[krazyKemist]

But you ought to float really high in honey, it is about 50% heavier than water.

So is sand. You can't swim in quicksand.

I guess that if you avoid moving (ie, swimming), you would just slowly sink.