Is there a difference between pure honey & raw honey? My labels say 100% pure honey, however my mother says what i'm selling is raw honey hence the question. By my thinking raw honey is honey that is unprocessed(brilliant deduction holmes) could straining be by the widest definition "processing" and is it not still 100% pure?
My understanding is it is all raw honey as long as you do not heat it. And that makes it Pure Raw Honey. Some beekeepers say pure honey, some say raw honey.
Now comes the fun part. Filtered or Unfiltered honey. Well I do not purchase any honey that says unfiltered. Who wants bee parts in the honey?
There are several interpretations of the meanings, but this is how I understand it.
Annette
I agree with Annette...raw means unheated. There is a market for unfiltered honey, though, apparently. Although presumably they expect to see more wax and pollen than bee parts.
and pure means no other ingredients, such as HFSC. Unfortunately, sellers can call honey raw unless its heated very high, my recollection is 155F even though proteins break down at about 112-115F. IMO, I would never call it raw if it was "warmed" over 112F. Just another reason to by from a small beekeeper as opposed to supermarket providers who "warm" honey into 130's so it flows fast for bottling. I also tell peopopel my honey is "lightly filtered" not micro filtered, leaving behind pollens. I send it through a collander is all, let it settle and skim off wax etc.
Lightly filtered sounds good. As long as it goes through some sort of filter it seems clean to me.
I have always under stood that if you send it through a filter it is filtered. If you strain it, be it wire mess or stockings or what ever it is strained honey. Straining takes out bee parts and large chucks of wax. filtering takes out everything, including the pollen. Pure honey is honey not diluted with sugar syrup.
I strain mine also and the only guarantee I give is that there will be no whole bees in the honey. :-D Wings, legs, ...ect you're on your own. :evil: Everyone smiles and love the honey. I have more people asking for honey than I can hope to fill. Makes me wish I had an outyard that won't starve them, or land where I could plant for it. :( Some folks want one to five gallons or more... HOOOBOOOY! :roll: Seems to be a working gimmick, even though it's true.
I agree with jsmob. When honey is filtered commercially, it's heated and pumped through a filtration system. Where unfiltered is still "filtered" but not forced through a filtration system where all the good stuff is taken out and all you get is honey. Instead unfiltered honey is run through one of those plastic screens that fit over a 5 gallon bucket you get from the beek catalogs. The good stuff get's through, larve and bee chunks stay behind.
Raw is not pasturized. Pure honey means there's nothing added like corn syrup or "syrup honey" like they make in some 3rd world countries where they feed bees tons of sugar syrup, the bees cap it, and then it's harvested like honey.
Sean Kelly
Quote from: annette on June 26, 2008, 10:19:25 PM
Lightly filtered sounds good. As long as it goes through some sort of filter it seems clean to me.
I'm guessing you wouldn't like the traditional way of making mead - since honey is low in nitrogen and nutrients, before the days of yeast energizer, it was common to add brood comb to the brew to feed the fermentation. Mmmm .... bee parts!
Quote from: Vetch on June 27, 2008, 03:46:45 PM
Quote from: annette on June 26, 2008, 10:19:25 PM
Lightly filtered sounds good. As long as it goes through some sort of filter it seems clean to me.
I'm guessing you wouldn't like the traditional way of making mead - since honey is low in nitrogen and nutrients, before the days of yeast energizer, it was common to add brood comb to the brew to feed the fermentation. Mmmm .... bee parts!
I will pass thank you
Thank god for yeast nutrients and energizers! Heck, in the days before Louie Pasture they didn't even add yeast! They didn't even know what yeast was and relied on the wild yeasts found naturally in honey! It was a crapshoot everytime they made the stuff.
Mmmmm.... I love mead.....
Sean Kelly
Quote from: Sean Kelly on June 27, 2008, 06:25:17 PM
Thank god for yeast nutrients and energizers! Heck, in the days before Louie Pasture they didn't even add yeast! They didn't even know what yeast was and relied on the wild yeasts found naturally in honey! It was a crapshoot everytime they made the stuff.
Mmmmm.... I love mead.....
Sean Kelly
OK I will keep an open mind. Perhaps one day I will taste mead!!!
Annette, I bet it's good..well the modern kind anyways, w/o bee gobbets!EEWWW that would be gross! :-P Jody
Mead is awesome and you can even find it commercially. There's a meadery here in Sultan, WA (up north east of Seattle) called Sky River Mead. They make a sweet, semi-sweet, and dry mead and I recommend every one! I just polished off a bottle 2 nights ago with my mother-in-law who also hadn't tried mead before but is a fan now too!
Jody, the Bonney Lake liquor store (next to the Subway and Office Depot) has Sweet & Semi-Sweet meads on their clearance table!!! $13 for a bottle right now and there were only a few left. I told my norwegian buddy from work too, so you better hurry before he buys them all up!!!
Sean Kelly
Quote from: annette on June 26, 2008, 06:41:21 PM
My understanding is it is all raw honey as long as you do not heat it. And that makes it Pure Raw Honey. Some beekeepers say pure honey, some say raw honey.
Now comes the fun part. Filtered or Unfiltered honey. Well I do not purchase any honey that says unfiltered. Who wants bee parts in the honey?
There are several interpretations of the meanings, but this is how I understand it.
Annette
Up until reading your post, I totally did not imagine I could find bee parts in purchased honey. I know there would never be bee parts in MY honey, because I would not harvest honey from a super with brood in it, and I have this habit of brushing off the bees before I take out the hot knife. But... I suppose if you are an indiscriminate beekeeper in Argentina who is collecting honey for Walmart... you might not be so ..well.. discriminate :)
Quote from: Sean Kelly on June 27, 2008, 05:42:50 AM
Raw is not pasturized.
Sean Kelly
True Sean,
We let ours drain through cheese cloth to get the cappings and such. IMHO pure/raw means just as the bees made it, nothing else, and not heated meaning not pasteurized.
David
Quote from: Melilem on October 08, 2008, 12:32:37 PM
Up until reading your post, I totally did not imagine I could find bee parts in purchased honey. I know there would never be bee parts in MY honey, because I would not harvest honey from a super with brood in it, and I have this habit of brushing off the bees before I take out the hot knife.
You've never had bees that landed in the cappings or perhaps got crushed in a frame on removal, either when clearing supers or a week earlier when you did an inspection? Bee parts don't get in there from the brood, usually, it is from mature bees, in my experience.
But raw, filtered, strained, all those terms really open cans of worms and every body does things a little different, at least on the internet forums.
I consider my honey raw even though I strain it a little and heat it lightly to drive off most of the crystals. It isn't on the label, but if people ask I will tell them. I don't worry about enzymes, because acid denatures them a lot quicker than a few degrees F will.
Do what you are comfortable with.
Rick
Quote from: Scadsobees on October 10, 2008, 01:54:35 PM
You've never had bees that landed in the cappings or perhaps got crushed in a frame on removal, either when clearing supers or a week earlier when you did an inspection?
No? :)