Laser Intended For Mars Used To Detect "Honey Laundering"

A laser tool funded by the European Space Agency to measure carbon on Mars is now being used to help detect fake honey. By burning a few milligrams of honey the laser isotope ratio-meter can help determine its composition and origin. From the article: "According to a Food Safety News investigation, more than a third of honey consumed in the U.S. has been smuggled from China and may be tainted with illegal antibiotics and heavy metals. To make matters worse, some honey brokers create counterfeit honey using a small amount of real honey, bulked up with sugar, malt sweeteners, corn or rice syrup, jaggery (a type of unrefined sugar) and other additives—known as honey laundering. This honey is often mislabeled and sold on as legitimate, unadulterated honey in places such as Europe and the U.S."

Comments

Buy local honey

[HotNeedleOfInquiry]

Most places in the US have a small local honey industry. Support it.

Re:Buy local honey

[gregor-e]

That's great and all, but in my experience, small local one-jar-at-a-time-by-hand producers charge about twice as much as the grocery store does. I can't believe that all the honey in the grocery store is fake. Or that the local producer's honey is really twice as good.

Re:Buy local honey

[Abstrackt]

I just make mead for my local apiary and get honey by the bucket in exchange. That obviously won't work for everybody but it's worth a shot if you're feeling adventurous.

Re:Buy local honey

[eksith]

Don't know about your local market, but in our market, yes, it is twice as good... and then some. Plus if you're talking about produce, it hasn't been on a truck half way across the country before getting to the display shelf, so you can be sure it's fresh. You do taste a difference.

Re:Buy local honey

[cyn1c77]

Most places in the US have a small local honey industry. Support it.

Supporting local businesses is good if you want small business to remain alive.

But that's not going to stop a "local" merchant from buying Chinese fake honey, pouring it in smaller bottles, and then selling it at twice the price.

So buying local isn't really a fix for smuggling and fraud.

Re:Buy local honey

[Ol Biscuitbarrel]

The farmers I buy from charge perhaps 15% more; the product tastes a fair bit better. There's my frickin' anecdote.

I was surprised by the 1/3+ figure in TFS too. That's a huge amount of honey to be slipping under the FDA radar, way too high to not become a major scandal, you'd think.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

seriously?

for as much as a person buys does it really matter if it cost twice as much to know you're getting locally-produced product? just skip a $6 coffee on the one day every six months honey is on your grocery list.

Re:Buy local honey

[poetmatt]

honey is one of the most important substances on the planet. As are the bees involved. It would do well to avoid grocery store honey whenever possible.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

I know an old neighbor in the town I grew up in. His honey is way better than store bought, and I wouldn't gladly buy it.

Re:Buy local honey

[Pecisk]

Sorry, but good honey have *never* been cheap. If it's cheap, it's probably not very good (it's good indicator).

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

I think what scared me the most is what antibiotics are in it, and what heavy metals? If you dupe me with something that is edible, but sugar related I wouldn't be as mad. I don't know, are those just scare words?

Re:Buy local honey

[StormShaman]

Fresh? I thought honey lasted for years. It certainly has to in my house; I don't use it very fast.

Re:Buy local honey

[fermion]

This advice cannot be overstated. The benefits cannot be overstated. When I travel, and am going to be there a week, I try to get a bit of local honey. It really helps with my allergies. It also provides an unique local flavor. Yes it does cost more and many will complain that the flavor is inconsistent, but do we really want to live in a world where everything is made to minimize cost and maximize consistency. I am sure that many do. For those who don't, local honey is one way to make the world a less banal place.

Re:Buy local honey

[codegen]

Even the guy with all the bees is not immune from corruption. He could be bulking up his own honey with corn syrup or other subsitutes as well.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

I take tomatoes. I didn't think about it until I grew some last year. The ones in the store are all perfect. And taste bland. Boy were the home grown ones better. But we do this to have them year round and consistent. I want to get better at cooking to the season rather than to the bland stuff. I do try and cook from scratch. So that helps knowing what is in your food.

Re:Buy local honey

[Gothmolly]

This. Our local farmer's market has a whole stall dedicated to peanuts - which don't grow within 1000 miles of here.

Re:Buy local honey

[Penguinisto]

Honey is one of the few foods to have a shelf life that approaches the half-life of uranium. There's honey dug up out of ancient Egyptian tombs that is/was still considered edible.

OTOH, the taste apparently degrades with time, which may explain GP's assertion.

Re:Buy local honey

[Myopic]

The shelf life of honey is measured in centuries. Freshness is a canard. There may be good reasons to buy local honey, but that isn't one of them.

Re:Buy local honey

[MightyYar]

I'm trying to figure out why there would be antibiotics in it? Do we have bee antibiotics? Or are these flower antibiotics?

Re:Buy local honey

[MightyYar]

Answering my own question:
"Oxytetracycline, an antibiotic, is widely used by keepers to get queen bees to lay more eggs."

So there you go!

Re:Buy local honey

[Kenja]

I can't believe that all the honey in the grocery store is fake.

If it costs half as much, odds are its got filler in it.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

no they just get it cheap from china and Argentina. Billy Bee honey in Canada is about 90% foreign honey that they buy dirt cheap. they are also getting what is called Honey Analog which is what this test is there to detect. gathering honey is FAR from an easy job. it is heavy hot and hard work for little pay out. (my parents are one of the bigger honey producers in Ontario) you dont make any money through the winter months. (other than what you can sell from the door) and you are going all balls to the wall during the summer. honey boxes on average weigh about 80lbs each, each yard my parents have has 20 hives, each with an average of 2-3 of these boxes coming off at any one time. then you have to exact it. to do 2 skids of boxes which is 12-16 boxes per skid is an entire days work. when they do sell their honey to packers (billy bee) they want to pay about half what the from the door price is. they make a not to bad living doing it. about 75k a year in a good year. but that is generally all at once when they sell to a packer. so that has to last them the entire year. i would not wish it on anybody. i would not get into the family business unless i had to.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

Something also to consider Honey you buy from the farmer wont be pasteurized. meaning all of the vitamins taste and other nutrients are still there. Pasteurization kills honey. it is no better than corn syrup after being pasteurized.

Re:Buy local honey

[Zemran]

" just skip a $6 coffee on the one day"???

Are you crazy? The neighbours would be wearing the honey... A day without coffee is far too dangerous.

Re:Buy local honey

[ColdWetDog]

Wait a minute. 'Honey bucket' means something dramatically different where I come from.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to break the news to you but yes the majority of all honey sold in supermarkets is Fake Honey.
http://www.foodrenegade.com/your-honey-isnt-honey/

Re:Buy local honey

[meglon]

I'd suggest any sampling based on 1 persons local area is probably not the norm, and may not even be close to average. While you have your local experience, here's mine: My brother, who has a small umber of hives, and does sell his honey one jar at a time (as opposed to when he was younger selling by the barrel to regional honey distributors), sells his lower than the area's stores do... not by a lot.... but lower, and it is definitely better honey. Additionally, other people he knows in the small end business sell roughly at the same price, and that price is lower than the 60lbs bucket rate at those regional honey distributors.

My suggestion is: find a different local beekeeper, and compare prices, or hell, even eBay if your local deal is charging twice the grocery store price. You'd get a better deal even with the postage, as twice grocery store prices is pretty obscene.... and pretty hard to believe.

Re:Buy local honey

[ridgecritter]

Agreed. Our local hardware store sells honey from local producers. Variety varies depending on what's in bloom and it's minimally processed, which I think is why it tastes so much better than the stuff in major grocery stores. The price is lots higher and I buy less of it than I might if I were buying at Safeway, but I enjoy it much more and I'm glad to support the local beekeepers. It's nice to drive by the hives where the honey came from on my way home.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

Get your honey from Trader Joe's then. Another article reported on testing of honey from major super markets, and pretty much all of it was fake with the exception of the honey they got from Trader Joe's, co-ops, and farmers markets.

http://eatocracy.cnn.com/2011/11/09/most-honey-sold-in-u-s-grocery-stores-not-worthy-of-its-name/

Re:Buy local honey

[cffrost]

Fresh? I thought honey lasted for years. It certainly has to in my house; I don't use it very fast.

Yes, but eksith said, "Plus if you're talking about produce, [...] you can be sure it's fresh."

Re:Buy local honey

[MBGMorden]

Much like the $100 audio cables, even as a person who really likes honey, i can't tell the difference. I certainly can tell between "honey flavored syrup" sold in the grocery store and actual honey, but for real honey it all tastes about the same to me. Same with syrup. I like to spring for actual maple syrup but beyond it just being real maple syrup the various brands don't taste any different.

Dunno. Maybe my pallet just isn't refined. I can't tell the difference between an "organic" vegetable and the regular ones from the grocery store either.

Re:Buy local honey

[hairyfish]

Price might matter if you're buying a million jars of honey. I get a few months out of a single jar, I think that whole extra $1 is worth it to not be poisoned.

Re:Buy local honey

[paiute]

Fresh? I thought honey lasted for years.

It does. That's why the honey you buy at the Stop & Shop could have been sitting in a tank in China for several years.

Re:Buy local honey

[eksith]

Nerds these days do seem to have a worrying lack of attention to detail ;) Besides you and ridgecritter below, everyone thought I was referring to only honey.

Re:Buy local honey

[davester666]

Yes, you do not want to mix up the honey buckets when you want an additive for your tea.

Re:Buy local honey

[arth1]

It's not just oxetetracycline, I'm afraid.

Unfortunately, the FDA only inspects a tiny fraction of what's out there.

As for heavy metals, Chinese apiaries too often use lead soldered frames. Honey reacts with metals, unfortunately.

Re:Buy local honey

[eksith]

If my Farmers' Market started selling netbooks, external HDs, motherboards and memory, yeah, I'd buy from them. Though NewEgg ships to me from Jersey usually, which is still kinda local (New York is a hop skip and a jump away). Books are harder to find outside Amazon, but Craigslist helped me to still buy local.

So far, the only electronics I've been able to buy local have been DIY stuff like PCBs that a friend prints for me and circuits I've asked to have assembled. All I don't have time and/or the skills to do myself. I still kept my old TV (a big-box Phillips) because it was good enough for what I watch and because the TV repair shop is just a short distance away in case I need it fixed.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe my pallet just isn't refined.

If you bring in honey by the pallet, it's no wonder your palate has no sensitivity. Maybe you should cut down, so you can experience the whole palette of flavours that nature intended.

Re:Buy local honey

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

yet many of the same people that cry "support local businesses" in this context, buy stuff on amazon or newegg all the time without batting an eye.

fucking hypocrites.

One minor little difference is that for agricultural commodities, there tend to be local producers(in most areas at least, exactly what is 'local' obviously varies by location and season). In the case of books or motherboards, it's pretty unlikely that you are doing anything other than choosing between the local reseller and the online reseller.

People who 'buy local' tend to want to either support a local/regional production system, or a local reseller that has some sort of brick-and-mortar charm. In the case of books or electronics, the former is mostly moot(most of it Just Isn't Made Locally, and if you do happen to live near an Intel chip fab or something, you probably 'buy local' no matter where you buy). The latter, unfortunately, tends to be largely moot. Back when I was in college, the local book store kicked ass, and everybody shopped there. Now, the local bookstore is just an appendage of Barnes and Noble, only with limited hours and an even more limited selection. At least I have MicroCenter, which makes buying all but relatively esoteric hardware in person worth doing.

Re:Buy local honey

[KiloByte]

I can't believe that all the honey in the grocery store is fake. Or that the local producer's honey is really twice as good.

If your local producer's honey is only twice as good, search better. You want that in unlabeled jars, at most with a handwritten post-it label.

I have no idea what mass-produced honey is made from, but one thing is certain: it has nothing to do with bees.

Re:Buy local honey

[mwvdlee]

I think he means this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honey_bucket.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

That's great and all, but in my experience, small local one-jar-at-a-time-by-hand producers charge about twice as much as the grocery store does. I can't believe that all the honey in the grocery store is fake. Or that the local producer's honey is really twice as good.

You find it hard to believe that a US vendor is charging twice as much as much as a Chinese vendor for an authentic product vs. a fake product cut with fillers?

You are reading an article about how honey is being smuggled in and contains contaminants such as heavy metals, and you're questioning if a local (pure) honey vendor's product is "twice as good" to justify it's price?

Welcome to planet Earth. You must be new here. Common Sense is first door on your right.

Re:Buy local honey

[ebonum]

I live in China. It is the same here. You can buy the crap from Carrefour ( think Walmart, but run by the French ), or you can buy from the local growers. Once you get out of the cities, you can find beekeepers that setup stands next to the highways. Most of them have boxes and boxes of hives with them. They move from farm to farm in the area, helping to pollinate the local crops. The honey they have on hand tends to be what they were last pollinating. If you ever get the chance to try some, do. It's really good stuff. Plus, it is always good to directly support the local farmers ( And Yes. They will try to up the price if you look like a city dweller. Just get back in the car. Start the engine and the price will drop 50%. )

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

The varieties of honey (determined by the predominant flora which the bees gather pollen from) have noticeable differences. Some are subtle; orange blossom honey does taste a little bit like oranges. Tupelo honey costs 2-3x as much and is considered the superior honey, but honestly I can't tell the difference between it and clover. However, I've gotta say any honey labeled as a specific variety is manyfold better than the stuff in the plastic bear. So what if it costs more? A jar of honey lasts me a year. I'll optimize somewhere else.

Now buckwheat honey, if you have a chance to try it, is almost nothing like `normal' honey; you might hate it, but it's worth trying. It is extremely dark and has an odd almost savory/umami taste. It's a bit weird on its own, but if you mix it with an acid (I use apple cider vinegar) and deglaze a steak pan, you get an amazing sauce... it's hard to believe it's only two ingredients (plus the fond and drippings from the steak of course).

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

But if you go to the right person, his customers tend to be more discerning as well. If he sells to a septuagenarian who's been buying his honey for decades, you can be assured that it's probably as good as it ever was. He knows that all he has to compete on is quality and reputation, so he'd damned well better keep it up, or he's toast. The great (and sometimes bad) thing about local economies is that word-of-mouth matters.

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

This article says differently.

Specifically, a lot of the honey (75%+) in grocery stores doesn't have the expected amount of pollen that pure honey would have. This doesn't necessarily mean that it's adulterated, of course, but since pollen is completely harmless and does nothing to affect longevity of the product, maybe one should be a bit suspicious about why they're removing it (note: the filtration is a process which increases production cost), if not to cover up fraud.

By contrast, every honey they sampled at farmers markets had the expected pollen. Again, this isn't an exhaustive study, but in contrast I see absolutely no support for your claim.

Re:Buy local honey

[mug funky]

it's worth it.

plus the more local it is, the more resistance to allergies and whatnot you'll supposedly gain.

i heard it somewhere so it must be true.

Re:Buy local honey

[JamesP]

Not saying it's your situation, but I'm sure the "fake honey" looks a lot more pretty and "fresh" and probably tastes better for the "fast food masses"

Fresh honey? Gimme the sitting in your shelf for ages, crystallized and it's still good thing.

Re:Buy local honey

[mug funky]

this post needs to be modded up for great flavour justice

Re:Buy local honey

[amiga3D]

One benefit of local honey is help with allergies for local conditions. I have a friend with severe allergy problems and he raises bees for this very reason. I have no allergy problems but he claims that consuming the honey from local bees helps greatly. It's best if you get the honey with the honeycomb as well.

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

All your bees are belong to us.

Re:Buy local honey

[sFurbo]

Apple cider vinegar mixed with any honey is a great basis for marinading meat. I will have to try and get some buckwheat honey, you make it sound amazing.

OMG, first result from googling the Danish phrase was a honey store with 40 different kinds of single flower honey. I HAVE to try coffee honey.

Re:Buy local honey

[amiga3D]

Tomatoes are probably the most noticeable product where local makes the biggest difference. The ones from the vine in my backyard are so much better than what's in the store that it's unbelievable. People have to try it to understand the difference.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

Well, that doesn't make it sound good to eat.

Re:Buy local honey

[idji]

it may easily be twice as good. Because you KNOW that the bees where not carted around the country on trucks, and that the bees ate pollen from a diverse range of flowers and trees rather than a monoculture covered in herbicide or fungicide. You are also directly contributing to the pollinators in YOUR own back yard - consider it a sound investment in local biodiversity.

Re:Buy local honey

[Barsteward]

"I can't tell the difference between an "organic" vegetable and the regular ones from the grocery store either."

there isn't much difference in taste, it just means it has been produced without chemicals so its more natural

Re:Buy local honey

[some old guy]

The local producer's honey IS twice as good. Believe it.

In this case, you do get what you pay for, with the added satisfaction of the money going to a neighbor, not ConAgra or Monsanto.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody set up us the bee!

Re:Buy local honey

[deimtee]

The ones in my backyard aren't on vines, they're on bloody trees.
The damn things are eight foot tall and still going.
(Grosse Lisse variety on what is apparently fairly good dirt.)

Re:Buy local honey

[BlackPignouf]

THAT.

As with meat, buying quality stuff is expensive, so just eat less of it!
We already eat way too much sugar and meat anyway.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

Many years ago I looked at the ingredient specification on a bottle of kecap (Indonesian soy sauce) of a brand that's popular in the Netherlands. Soy should have been the main ingredient, but it wasn't. I don't recall if it was missing completely or if it was way down the list, but I do remember yeast extracts were the main ingredient. Not what I would call soy sauce, but I hadn't noticed a difference in taste. They only seem to have done that for a short while, they have returned to using soy.

Modern food processing industries are very focused on producing a consistent and predictable product. Natural ingredients aren't that consistent, so they blend and manipulate to produce the required taste and other properties. I can imagine that if how the product is experienced by people becomes the main property the means by which that experience is accomplished becomes secondary. When you get to that point "kecap" doesn't need to be made of soy, as long as it tastes and behave like kecap, and "honey" doesn't need to be produced by bees as long as it tastes and behaves like honey. Another example is caramel colored bread. It looks healthier than white bread but it isn't. It's not necessarily bad food in all cases, but we are being lied to.

This, by the way, is also why I'm allergic to the word 'experience' used for almost everything software related nowadays. That word makes it sound as if appearences are the main property of the product, not what it is and does but what it seems to be and do, and that to me is an indication that I'm being lied to. UX design, *shudder*.

Re:Buy local honey

[shentino]

News at 11, humans are greedy fuckers and will cheat you every chance they get.

Re:Buy local honey

[TheMathemagician]

They probably charge a price which reflects a reasonable markup on their costs and labour time. Of course industrial-scale food production will always be cheaper - otherwise why do it. You should be asking just how brutally the big suppliers are cutting corners to lower their price.

Re:Buy local honey

[egcagrac0]

I HAVE to try coffee honey.

That sounds interesting, but the coffee honey is likely to taste of coffee blossoms, not roasted coffee seeds. You may not get the flavor you're hoping for.

Re:Buy local honey

[sFurbo]

The homepage describes it as having "a light coffee flavor", but now that you mention it, that is highly implausible. Most of the aroma compounds in coffee is a result of the roasting, so how in the world should a product of the flowers get that taste? Oh, well, I still have to try it.

Re:Buy local honey

[samson13]

I'd generally agree with the buy local bit but cheap testing would be useful for them too. Bee's are pretty much wild animals so unless they are located in true wilderness or in the middle of farm land that you control then there could be anything in the honey.

Slashdot had an article on blue honey a couple of months ago.

You just need somebody to spill a bucket of the fake honey and a few weeks later it might be being sold by the local bee keeper.

Re:Buy local honey

[egcagrac0]

Fresh? I thought honey lasted for years.

The honey may last for years; it's likely however that there are delicate flavors that get lost as it ages.

Bread may last for a few weeks, but when it's fresh, it seems to taste better (or at least different, if we're not going to make assumptions about flavor preference).

Re:Buy local honey

[N!k0N]

News at 11, humans are greedy fuckers and will cheat you every chance they get.

Greedy as they are, they're mostly harmless.

Re:Buy local honey

[sumdumass]

A lot of the honey in the store is filtered a lot more then from local producer. You end up with the pollen and other fragments removed in store brand where this usually is still present in local brands.

With that being said, not everyone can tell the difference but those who can will strongly favor one over the other. If you can taste a difference between clover honey and buckwheat honey, you will likely value the local supplier over the industrialized store brands and be willing to pay twice as much.

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

When I saw this story it made me wonder why we're importing honey in the first place. I googled how much honey is produced in the US, the American Beekeepers Federation says US production is down 13%, bee colonies are down 7%, and prices are up. The grocery store is probably importing Chinese honey because slave labor is cheap (by "slave labor" I mean wage slaves). Plus, do you check the label on the honey? I haven't bought honey in like forever, but it may well be that the label's fine print says something like "water, sugar, and syrup added". Who reads labels?

Personally, since I'm not impoverished I'd rather pay extra for domestically made (locally is even better). You're talking what, a buck or two? Saving a dollar on a jar of honey then spend as much at McDonalds for a quarter pounder with cheese and fries when a dozen raw hamburger patties, a loaf of bread, and a big bag of potatoes costs the same, and takes less time to cook than waiting in line at a fast food joint. It's insane to my mind.

Help your local economy, not some uber-rich multinational corporation.

Re:Buy local honey

[arth1]

Which is a reasonable assumption in a thread about buying local honey, as long as there is no indication that something else is meant.

Apart from the noun "produce", you mean?

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

A lot of people like their coffee sweet, and many of them put honey in their coffee. It seems to me that coffee honey in coffee would be damned good, if you like sweet coffee (I don't).

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

We already eat way too much sugar and meat anyway.

We? I'm not overweight (maybe even a little underweight), don't have diabetes or heart disease, so how could I possibly be eating too much meat and sweets?

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

Fresh honey? Gimme the sitting in your shelf for ages, crystallized and it's still good thing.

You can uncrystallize honey by heating.

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

You know, for an extra two bucks you can get almost a pound of Folgers or Maxwell House which perks pots and pots of coffee. His point is, if you're spending six bucks for a cup of something that costs pennies to make, bitching about an extra buck for quality honey is just stupid. Especially since that jar of honey will do you for months instead of hours.

If I were moderating you'd get a "funny".

It just struck me why people drive so stupid when I'm on my way to work -- they're racing to Starbucks, while I'm already well caffenated.

Re:Buy local honey

[osvenskan]

Tupelo honey costs 2-3x as much and is considered the superior honey, but honestly I can't tell the difference between it and clover.

Tupelo honey is more valuable to me because it's much less prone to crystallize (due to the sugars in it). Clover honey seems to crystallize if you do so much as look at it funny.

Re:Buy local honey

[drsquare]

If the honey in your grocery store is cheaper, now you know why. People expect their food to be dirt cheap without any consequences. This, and the horseburger scandal are the natural end-game to decades of relentless cost-cutting by supermarkets and bargain-chasing by consumers.

Re:Buy local honey

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

The container camp owners drive around to pump out your camper is similarly called the honey pot.

Re:Buy local honey

[Charliemopps]

Twice as much? I usually find it somewhere in the 10x the price range for local honey. It DOES taste better and all... but 10x as much? I don't think so.

Re:Buy local honey

[Hentes]

I can't believe that all the honey in the grocery store is fake.

It is. Almost all honey in stores have been tampered with. That doesn't mean a local producer will always sell you good stuff, you will have to find an honest beekeeper and then stick him.

Re:Buy local honey

[TheRaven64]

Depends on what you're doing with it. If you're putting it in tea, or in a sauce, then the cheap honey is fine. If you're spreading it on toast, then there's a big difference in taste.

Re:Buy local honey

[WindBourne]

Depending on how much honey you use, It is a lot cheaper than the medical issues that you can come up with. China's honey is VERY bad for you. In fact, most of their food is. The run little pollution controls.

Re:Buy local honey

[datapharmer]

The tupelo price isn't just for the taste, it is because true tupelo honey won't sugar on you like regular honey will.

Re:Buy local honey

[andydread]

Well given that one sixth of China's farmland is contaminated with heavy metals this is not surprising. read the lables on everythng before you buy it. Stay far from any foodstuff that is produced in China. The corner cutting culture in China is pervasive. Melamine in milk, Fake Honey, the list goes on and on.

Re:Buy local honey

[Bob the Super Hamste]

Try honey on some fresh home made out of the oven corn bread. It is one of the best things I have ever ate.

Re:Buy local honey

[andydread]

Link: one sixth of China's farmland is contaminated with heavy metals

Re:Buy local honey

[ryzvonusef]

Our local hardware store sells honey from local producers.

Um, Hardware store means the place where they sell lumber and plumbing, right? Why would they have honey?

Re:Buy local honey

[Bob the Super Hamste]

I see honey at the store and it is like colored glass while the filtered honey I get from a relative is some what cloudy and the unfiltered stuff is almost opaque. I got introduced to unprocessed unfiltered honey in college from a guy who's parents mailed him the stuff from their family farm in Africa. It was interesting as there was a more robust flavor and more variety from jar to jar.

Re:Buy local honey

[rockytopchip]

Place your bottle of crystallized honey in a warm water bath and it will be like it was when freshly bottled, without the crystallization.

Re:Buy local honey

[Bob the Super Hamste]

Sounds like you had the problem I had last year with tomatoes. I need to get bigger tomato cages as they grew up, out, and back down the cages I have and then started growing up the corn stalks. They were probably close to 8 feet long when the first hard frost hit and did them in.

Re:Buy local honey

[tverbeek]

Considering that a pound of honey is enough to sweeten more cups of tea and bowls of oatmeal than I am inclined to try to count, I don't think it's worth bothering to save money on it by buying the cheapest available. This kind of penny pinching at any cost is how we end up with an economy of WalMarts and minimum wage jobs. Instead I buy honey from time to time as I run out from one of the stalls at the local farmer's market.

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

The fact that honey doesn't spoil does not imply that the flavor is maintained. Of course, independent of the freshness itself, local honey usually is made from an assortment of flowers that impart their own unique flavors, unlike the bland clover and corn syrup commercial stuff.

Re:Buy local honey

[tverbeek]

Because the owner knows someone who makes honey, and wants to support other local businesses?

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

We keep about 20 hives of bees and I grow buckwheat on a portion of my garden each year specifically for the bees. That honey is darker and more flavorful than any I've ever encountered elsewhere.

The local apiary group hosts a honey tasting event each year; the range of colors and flavors in the local area is amazing.

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

Just be careful that you don't heat it too much. Warm it like good BBQ - slow and low. Also, you'll often end up with some foam on top when you are finished. This stuff is like marshmallow cream, expect it is pure honey. I can't explain just how good it is.

Re:Buy local honey

[JamesP]

Fresh honey? Gimme the sitting in your shelf for ages, crystallized and it's still good thing.

You can uncrystallize honey by heating.

I know that. But the crystallized one is less messy.

Re:Buy local honey

[sl4shd0rk]

small local one-jar-at-a-time-by-hand producers charge about twice as much as the grocery store does.

Dude, think about how much honey you actually go through. Unless you're Winnie the Pooh, that's not a very strong case for not supporting your local farms. So what if 8oz cost $10 bucks -- I bet if you average out the expense you've only spent a couple bucks/month to have some fresh, local product in your pantry. What's more, the farmer wins too and manages to keep a business going. Everyone wins and in a roundabout way, the environment wins too because now your "Honey" didn't have to get brought in from half-way around the world by Ship, Plane, Train or Truck.

This is the way things used to work but ever since we've come to rely on "manufactured" food, our choice have become limited and the quality and ingredients questionable and sometimes downright treacherous.

If you don't support your local farm, you will find yourself with no other choice BUT the chinese black market Propylene Glycol "alternative".

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

its not used to make them lay more eggs, it is an Antibiotic to help get rid of what is called Foul Brood. it turns the larva in the cells into a stinky brown slime. the bee's cant clean this up by themselves. if it isn't caught in time the whole hive must be destroyed. which is generally done by blocking all the entrances to the hive pouring gasoline into it. and burning it. the heat kills the bacteria. and destroys any honey in the hive. as bee's are scavengers they will raid a dead hive to steal the honey. if you dont burn the diseased hive they will take the bacteria back to a healthy hive and infect it.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

it was structured nicely until i hit submit then it changed it to a wall of text. as for spelling. get over it.

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

We have about 20 hives as well but keep them purely as a hobby. They help us with our garden and fruit trees, as well as providing enough honey each year for us, our extended family, and close friends. We do not manage them for multiple extractions a year or other high production goals. The time and work is certainly not for the uninterested but neither is it a killer. I genuinely enjoy working with them and I love the honey we get.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

i might consider it, but i myself hate honey. only time i eat it is when i have a sore throat. after 20 years of working with honey i don't like it at all.

Re:Buy local honey

[clonehappy]

Of course, all this means is that the Honey Industry Association of America just needs to lobby Congress to ensure farmer's market honey is labeled "dangerous to public health" because of all that pollen, while noting that their product only has 1/4 of the pollen.

Tactical teams, of course, would need to be used on any of the dangerous terrorist farmers that continue to produce the "poisonous" honey, and maybe they could even get Monsanto to engineer some bees to let loose near their farms so we can save the SWAT money and just sue them out of existence in court.

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

I grow many different varieties of heirloom tomatoes; my Hillbilly Potato Leaf vines often grow at least 8 feet and will be two inches in diameter. They destroy every tomato cage I've tried so now I use a heavy cage reinforced with a t-post driven beside it and wired to it for extra support. I hate dealing with the vines but the tomatoes are huge and taste wonderful.

Re:Buy local honey

[Megane]

I sure don't want honey that was sitting in one of those Tiananmen square tanks!

Re:Buy local honey

[GreyWolf3000]

Why does everyone wonder why locally produced food costs so much, instead of wondering why the over processed megacorp garbage is so cheap?

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

my dad at least loves working with the bee's his father was a beekeeper, as was his fathers father. I don't know how far back they go as beekeepers. But its a ways. unfortunately i am not big enough to lug the boxes around all summer. With 600 hives to their name and an average of 2 boxes each that's a LOT of lifting(some only get 1 box, others can get up to 4 boxes over the summer) if there were easier ways to do it. And if farming wasn't getting so difficult in the area my parents live id for sure do it for work, as there is nothing id like better than being my own boss.

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

Commercial tomato varieties are bred for tough red skin and blemish-free fruit. Flavor has no part in the equation. The commercial tomato industry was on the verge of collapse due to the increase in mechanization in farming but tomatoes were so fragile that there was no ability harvest them without destroying them. So the food scientists developed breeds that were firm, that were uniform in appearance, and that could be picked earlier. US producers pick their tomatoes while still completely green and subject them to 24 hours of ethylene gas to artificially ripen them. Many are refrigerated to further reduce spoilage but this also destroys nearly all of the flavor that may have accidentally remained.

Recent research has indicated that the same genes that cause the uniform coloration selected for in commercial tomatoes also cause the fruit to convert the sun's energy into sugars. It isn't just that the round, red tomato-like cardboard balls at the store lost their flavor because it wasn't a priority in the breeding program - it appears that the flavor and appearance may be mutually exclusive.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

North American Frames are made from wood, and a lot are switching over to all plastic frames. Honey is a very light Acid, it will eat most any metal. all of my parents extracting equipment is made from Medical grade Stainless steel. Their whole Extracting line cost them almost a years pay (75k), if it is not in use it must be washed down to get the honey off.

Re:Buy local honey

[swb]

It makes me crazy that most "Farmer's Markets" here in Minneapolis (including the big one just north of downtown) are flooded with produce not grown in Minnesota.

IMHO, sellers whose products are GROWN in Minnesota should pay far less for stall space, and sellers whose products aren't should pay double and be forced to post signage that says "OUR PRODUCTS ARE NOT GROWN IN MINNESOTA".

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

That's ONLY if the honey is not Pasteurized. Once it is Pasteurized it has a shelf life about the same as normal food. The main reason for this is Honey is itself kills germs. it has been used for centuries for poultices, as it kills bacteria, is full of nutrients that the cut flesh can actually draw from, to heal faster and with less scar tissue. My parents have used it on one of their horses that seriously injured its back leg (you could see the Tendon moving) it took 3 months with Honey poultices to heal (the vet said the horse would need to be put down, he was well and truly amazed that the honey worked so well) all that is left is a slight ruffle in the fur on the spot.

Re:Buy local honey

[SoldierII]

I suggest you give it a try. Go and buy a jar of cheap "Wal-Mart" brand honey and then buy a jar that is local sold by a local beekeeper. You will notice a huge difference in taste and flavor.

Re:Buy local honey

[Admiral Llama]

Actually a group went around testing honey from local retailers and found that 100% or nearly 100% of all honey purchased at places like CVS, Wal-Mart and a few grocers were at minimum ultrafiltered. Normally they filter out chunks of flowers and bee parts, but leave the pollen in. The ultrafiltered stuff is filtered to the point where the pollen is also extracted which is a costly and completely unnecessary step that just happens to mask the honey's origin. You can tell where honey came from based upon what the pollen is.

http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2011/11/tests-show-most-store-honey-isnt-honey/

Re:Buy local honey

[CowTipperGore]

When my dad was a kid, his uncle kept bees in hollowed out logs and used absolutely no protective gear when he worked them. I helped Dad occasionally with his when I was younger but only recently got involved again. My oldest is 12 and will have his own bee suit this year.

I don't ever see us getting by on nothing but farm income. We raise a small herd of cattle, raise chickens, grow a large garden, keep bees, and do countless other self-sufficient activities but I still have a full-time job. Last week I had some t-bone steaks from a young heifer we raised and butchered this past fall. She lived her life on pasture and was two-years old (ancient in the commercial beef market) when slaughtered. Those t-bones were, without a doubt, the most tender steaks I have ever had the pleasure to cook and eat. Yesterday's dinner was a pork roast from the pig we raised last year. Breakfast today was eggs from our chickens.

I know, with reasonable certainty, what went into the production of a good portion of my food. I know the life it lived. I am able to select varieties that are more flavorful (in the case of vegetables) or more self-sufficient themselves (in the case of animals). I know the level of antibiotics used and why.

Re:Buy local honey

[freeze128]

The bees are dark roasted for that rich flavor....

Re:Buy local honey

[kryliss]

You just have to wonder, is there any good that ever comes out of China?

Re:Buy local honey

[drinkypoo]

Our local safeway sells pretty good honey. And it really is half the price of buying from the locals, which is frustrating because there's a lot of competition.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

I was told you need to chop off the top at some point so the growing is focused in the fruit, not more "vine". I have only grown for one year though.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

It isn't just that the round, red tomato-like cardboard balls at the store lost their flavor because it wasn't a priority in the breeding program - it appears that the flavor and appearance may be mutually exclusive.

Quoted for laugh.

Re:Buy local honey

[egcagrac0]

I have a feeling that it's the same way with honey that hasn't been stabilized and dough-conditionered.

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

Mystery solved. For whatever reason, crystallization's never been a problem for me, but good to know. Thanks.

Re:Buy local honey

[Specter]

+1 and wiki link to foul brood.

Re:Buy local honey

[retchdog]

Interesting. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhododendron#Toxicology

Re:Buy local honey

[amiga3D]

I don't really worry about pruning them. I have more than I can use and unload a huge surplus on friends.

Re:Buy local honey

[Culture20]

Which is more profitable, keeping bees and only selling the honey they make, or keeping bees, cutting the honey with corn syrup, and selling double the product?

Re:Buy local honey

[amiga3D]

Well maybe it's all in his head. Like I say I don't suffer from allergies but those that do are all into that myth.

Re:Buy local honey

[dwye]

you will have to find an honest beekeeper

Um, how? Unless you are willing to spend a couple of days monitoring the beekeeper, or have access to enough lab equipment to do that, you still end up trusting some character that you probably never met before.

and then stick him.

I hope you meant "stick with him" :-)

Re:Buy local honey

[eksith]

Tomato is a fruit, technically. But unless you're being needlessly pedantic, most people would put it in the vegetable category. Honey is technically produce, but etc... etc... Let's just admit few people were paying attention to the "produce" bit at all and you, along with most others were just, assuming too much.

Re:Buy local honey

[DriveDog]

I see a detractor has noted that "local" honey sellers could dilute the honey with choney. Absolutely, and I have no doubt that some have. So not only buy local, but establish a relationship with the local beekeeper.

Also, modifying our immune sytems to reduce allergic reactions is not an all-or-nothing prospect. Consuming some pollen may help desensitize ourselves somewhat, which is better than nothing.

Finally, smuggled/artificial honey mixers could theoretically produce whatever flavor they want, but in practice they're unlikely to produce the flavors you might find harvested locally. Around here, sourwood honey is highly prized, but I suspect much of what's marketed as such comes from bees located a looong way from sourwood. Sellers can ask more for honey labelled as sourwood, so it becomes a counterfeiting target. Choose something not so trendy, so it's not such a target for fakers.

Re:Buy local honey

[airdweller]

What a load of crap.
"That's ONLY if the honey is not Pasteurized. Once it is Pasteurized it has a shelf life about the same as normal food. "
Honey doesn't have to be pasteurized. It sometimes is as a precaution (to kill yeast) b/c it will ferment if kept in a humid environment. Anybody who ever tried raw honey knows that it can be kept for years in a tightly closed container.

"The main reason for this is Honey is itself kills germs."
The main reason for what? Pasteurization? Shelf life? You aren't making any sense.

"it kills bacteria, is full of nutrients that the cut flesh can actually draw from"
"Flesh" doesn't "draw nutrients" from anything applied to it.

Re:Buy local honey

[ryzvonusef]

But, how will he support them, if all the buyers to his shop are more interested in 2x4s and other, non-edible, construction and maintenance related stuff?

Seems a bit...random, that's all.

Re:Buy local honey

[GrantRobertson]

I have to admit, what Izuzan said sounds like homeopathy bullshit. However, where is your empirical evidence that "'Flesh' doesn't "draw nutrients" from anything applied to it." As a matter of fact, "flesh" does draw nutrients from something applied to it all day every day. That something is blood. Other than oxygen bound to hemoglobin, as far as I know, all other nutrients are simply dissolved in the blood serum. The primary nutrient is glucose. Honey is loaded with glucose. Human tissue "draws nutrients" from the substrates they are grown on in dishes in labs all the time. Wounds, by their nature, have a reduced blood supply, thus less glucose for cells to live on. A honey poultice could conceivably make up for some or all of that lost glucose supply, plus some trace nutrients. Keep in mind, honey "evolved" as a way to provide nutrients to baby bees. While they aren't human, the basic nutrient requirements of cells is approximately the same for all living things other than some bacteria.

I am all about science. But true science is not about ridiculing something just because it doesn't sound like what you read in a science book in third grade. True science is about taking a hint from the experience of yourself or others, building a hypotheses and TESTING that hypotheses. Science only stops when arrogant blowhards decide they know everything there is to know.

Re:Buy local honey

[Synerg1y]

I'm not sure about the whole "drawing nutrients" piece, but applying anti-biotics to an open wound to make it heal faster makes perfect sense. Honey happens to contain these. And I agree, we aren't at a point with science where we can explain everything, or why some house hold hand me down remedies work better than modern medicine for certain ailments.

Re:Buy local honey

[sjames]

If 1/3 of honey is fake or contaminated as TFA suggests, and considering that the honey from the grocery store is blended, then nearly all of it would contain some percentage of fake or contaminated honey.

Re:Buy local honey

[sjames]

A nice side-effect is that local honey can desensitize you to the local pollens and make spring much more enjoyable.

Re:Buy local honey

[tragedy]

You're probably just from a much larger town, or at least one without many locally owned stores.

Re:Buy local honey

[sjames]

Same base compounds in the blossom and seed. In roasting, heat cracks them into aromatics, in honey bee digestive enzymes and alkali might have a similar effect.

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

What do you think Polysporin does ? is isnt just an antibacterial ointment. if the cells are open on the surface (a gash with raw edges) if there is something applied to it that has nutrients in it that are easy to access it will use them.

Re:Buy local honey

[airdweller]

"..."flesh" does draw nutrients from something applied to it all day every day. That something is blood. Other than oxygen bound to hemoglobin, as far as I know, all other nutrients are simply dissolved in the blood serum. The primary nutrient is glucose. Honey is loaded with glucose. Human tissue "draws nutrients" from the substrates they are grown on in dishes in labs all the time. Wounds, by their nature, have a reduced blood supply, thus less glucose for cells to live on. Keep in mind, honey "evolved" as a way to provide nutrients to baby bees. "
I thought about that, but couldn't find any corroborating data.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wound_healing by the way. I don't think you understand the nature of wound healing correctly.
If I'm not mistaken, no mechanism for cells to absorb nutrients from the "outside" was discovered so far.
Also, bee larvae don't just absorb the nutrients from honey - they digest it.
The beneficial properties of honey are usually attributed to "...low water activity causing osmosis, chelation of free iron, its slow release of hydrogen peroxide, high acidity, and the antibacterial activity of methylglyoxal."
I am a skeptic, but so far, _everything_ I learned in the third grade still holds true. As compared to _nothing_ I was told by the "bright-eyed science revolutionaries" seeking to "overthrow the tyranny of the dogmatic science".

Re:Buy local honey

[airdweller]

"What do you think Polysporin does ? is isnt just an antibacterial ointment."
Ummm... It's an antibiotic? What else does it do? Fight communism?

Maybe you should've at least googled Polysporin before posting. I did. There you go: it consists of Bacitracin ("which disrupts bacteria by interfering with the cell wall and phospholipid synthesis") and Polymyxin B ("which binds to the cell membrane and alters its structure, making it more permeable. The resulting water uptake leads to cell death.") You're welcome.

Re:Buy local honey

[qwak23]

I once marinated turkey breasts in a mixture of apple cider vinegar, honey, and chipotle Tabasco sauce and then cooked sous vide. It was ridiculously delicious.

Re:Buy local honey

[Anonymous Coward]

The benefits, in fact, *can* be overstated, as you have just done. Local honey helping with allergies is a compelling bit of medical mythology, but it's simply not true: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/10/health/10really.html?_r=0

Re:Buy local honey

[qwak23]

Nature abhors chemicals.

Re:Buy local honey

[Shatrat]

How do you know the guy at the farmer's market actually has bees and isn't just selling the cheapest stuff he can find online in fancy bottles? I'll tell you how, with a LASER.

Re:Buy local honey

[mattack2]

Agreed. Our local hardware store sells honey from local producers.

Seems like a slightly odd place to buy food. Hammers & honey, all in one spot!

minimally processed

Explain exactly what "processing" is doing to other honey (or other products that you buy that are "less processed").

Re:Buy local honey

[mattack2]

Though to use your own argument against you, the people who are going to Starbucks think it's worth the extra price, whether it be for the social aspect, or the cent of caramel syrup added to the coffee or whatever.

(I think it's way overpriced too, though the free coffee machines we have at work are Starbucks brand, so presumably they're similar to the plain coffees you can get at Starbucks.)

Re:Buy local honey

[mattack2]

That's why the Preview button is there. I didn't notice your spelling errors (usually I do), but you definitely need to fix your shift key.

Re:Buy local honey

[omnichad]

Only if milk can.

Re:Buy local honey

[deimtee]

Yeah I used to do that. Prune back to one main trunk and limit its height. You end up with larger but sunburnt tomatoes.
Now I let them grow as much as they want. The extra foliage shades the fruit, and while the plants take extra space, you also get much more, but smaller, fruit. I think the large tomatoes are bland compared to the smaller "more wild" ones.
You just need to give them more support than a stake, and plenty of water. Some fertilizer doesn't hurt either.

Re:Buy local honey

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Its not all fake, its %33 fake. However, that isn't 1 out of every 3 bottles, thats 1/3 of each bottle. So, you know, take your risks as you see fit. I'd rather go without honey than eat the contaminated stuff.

Re:Buy local honey

[omnichad]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impulse_purchase

Re:Buy local honey

[Rufus Firefly]

Protip: You can tell when the sentence ends by looking for one of these things.<--

HTH

Re:Buy local honey

[omnichad]

Saving a dollar on a jar of honey then spend as much at McDonalds for a quarter pounder with cheese and fries when a dozen raw hamburger patties, a loaf of bread, and a big bag of potatoes costs the same, and takes less time to cook than waiting in line at a fast food joint. It's insane to my mind.

Wha? A quarter pounder with cheese (full combo to be generous) costs around $3.29 where I live. Raw ground beef hovers around $3/lb. at its lowest, and so a dozen burger patties would cost $9 at the least. McDonald's does charge a premium for convenience, but it's not that high.

Re:Buy local honey

[cheater512]

Yes the Chinese are adding Mercury to their fake honey.

Or not. They'd have to go to a bit of effort to do that.
Chances are China has fewer checks and balances on heavy metals and antibiotics so the article says that the fake honey could have them in it to sensationalise the story.
With no connection to reality of course.

Re:Buy local honey

[Hentes]

It's fairly easy, find one that sells good stuff. After you stop buying supermarket crap you will be able to taste the difference.

Re:Buy local honey

[Schmorgluck]

Oh yeah! Buckwheat honey! I haven't had that in years. Great stuff to put in a Breton buckwheat galette.

Re:Buy local honey

[DKlineburg]

Maybe when I have a house, I will do this. I unfortunately only have a porch. And it is small. :( I miss the country I grew up in. (US, just not in suburbs).

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

My beef isn't spelling, it's starting sentences with lower case. The only time spelling bothers me is when it changes the meaning of the sentence ("The bank should loose their money"), and when it's obvious that a comment is written by someone barely literate ("They're house is on fire").

I didn't even notice the misspellings, it was the look of "this long paragraph is a single sentence". Periods don't stand out, upper case letters do.

As for formatting, you probably had it set to "HTML" rather than "plain text".

Re:Buy local honey

[Izuzan]

The main cash crop my parents have is selling Pollen. it helps with allergies (as long as it is taken from the flowers in the general area you live) honey helps because it contains some pollen. to bring a point to it. my parents are governed to somewhere around $4 a Kg for honey. for 500grams of pollen is worth $15. Pollen is also an Excellent Energy supplement.

Re:Buy local honey

[Reziac]

Personally I hate buckwheat honey, but when I worked for a beekeeper, it was most of what he produced, cuz there's a big market for it in China, and the price was better.

Re:Buy local honey

[cthulhu11]

Is your bumble-barf consumption really high enough that the price different matters?

Re:Buy local honey

[mcgrew]

I shouldn't have to hunt for the smallest punctuation mark there is while reading. It's fine if you move your lips when you read, not when you're used to reading books.

Re:Buy local honey

[eionmac]

Likewise in UK. I buy local honey from local shop. They stock what is available from local beekeepers so varies with seasons. about 20% over supermarket price and label defines the beekeeper and flower variety. While a kid in Scotland we bought by 'honey can' a tin drum about 7 litres, but that was only heather honey, very strong taste and dark. Kept us through the winter.

Re:Buy local honey

[zipn00b]

Flesh is the integumentary system - the largest organ in the body and it does indeed absorb MANY things applied to it or transdermal medication wouldn't work.

Re:Buy local honey

[airdweller]

Yes, it absorbs _many_ things, but does it absorb _nutrients_? That's what we're talking about here.

Re:Buy local honey

[CHIT2ME]

Just pay the price for locally produced honey. Good grief, how much honey do you use anyway!

Re:Buy local honey

[studog-slashdot]

I'm in Ontario and would love to buy from your parents. Link or corporate name?

Re:Buy local honey

[Do You Smell That]

I'd imagine the fact that it has a detectable odor implies that the flavor cannot be indefinitely maintained...

Re:Buy local honey

[Locke2005]

Another thing about local honey -- it helps you build up an immunity to pollen allergies! Sounds bizarre, but I suggested it to my Mom, and she says it worked.

Re:Buy local honey

[Locke2005]

Yes and no. Over a long distance, say hundreds of feet, there is probably perceptible phase distortion. Over the 3 foot length of typical cables, I don't think it makes any detectable difference.

All the more reason

[eksith]

You should try to buy from your local Farmer's Market if there's one nearby, whenever possible. You will be supporting your local economy and you can be reasonably sure a local merchant isn't pumping poison into the product or the groundwater (or else someone will have noticed). Especially when it's their water too.

I stocked up on some excellent honey and combs (these are delicious!) past Summer from our local market and they hold one at least twice a week near the town square. It's a good way to meet people in your area the old fasioned way too as opposed to FB, Twitter et al.

Not mentioned in the article...

[larry bagina]

Ok, fake honey is bad. But even legitimate Chinese honey is crap. Honey is honey, right? Bees fly around, collect nectar, then spit out honey. (Yeah, yeah, the types of flowers affects the taste. I'm getting to that.) But a lot of Chinese honey doesn't involve flowers at all -- the bees drink sugar water. For all I know, that happens in the US, too. As mentioned above, go to a farmer's market and buy some local honey.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[Trepidity]

I'm not 100% sure, but I believe in the U.S. the economics work out so that there's no incentive to fake the flower part and have your bees drink sugar water. Sort of the opposite, actually. Bees for crop pollination are enough in demand that some beekeepers actually make more money taking them around to pollinate crops than they do from selling the honey!

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[arth1]

I'm not 100% sure, but I believe in the U.S. the economics work out so that there's no incentive to fake the flower part and have your bees drink sugar water. Sort of the opposite, actually

Unfortunately, this is not the case. Most honey farmers will take out so much honey of the hives that they have to feed the bees sugar water to survive the winter. This in turn leads to crappier honey next season.

Some of the apiaries wont do this to their bees (and customers). But for most of them, even local ones, money is what matters, and sugar and corn syrup is a lot cheaper than honey.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[Izuzan]

They also don't have the food and safety laws we do in the US and Canada. much of the honey from china is from small farmers that are using old burlap sacks to squeeze the honey out of the comb. they all bring their honey to a central area and pour it into a big bin. in Canada at least if the govt tests your honey and finds a chemical that is more than the legal parts per million ALL of your honey is condemned. they confiscate it and you get no money that year. my parents have to have Samples from each yard they have to send to the govt for testing. if something is wrong they can take the honey from the problem yard.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[ShanghaiBill]

Most honey farmers will take out so much honey of the hives that they have to feed the bees sugar water to survive the winter.

I have a beehive in my backyard. I always give them some sugar water during the winter. I don't know any other beekeepers that don't do the same. It helps lower the winter die-back, and helps the hive get a strong start in the spring.

This in turn leads to crappier honey next season.

I have never heard this before. The bees eat the sugar, and it is all consumed by the time they start making new honey. I give them their last feeding in February, and they don't start making new honey till April. The sugar is not mixed with honey harvested for human consumption.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[ridgecritter]

Thanks for this, would mod you informative if I had points. Interesting.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[arth1]

I have a beehive in my backyard. I always give them some sugar water during the winter. I don't know any other beekeepers that don't do the same. It helps lower the winter die-back, and helps the hive get a strong start in the spring.

So does leaving enough honeycomb for the bees. Where I come from, the hive would have nine frames, of which two would remain unharvested. If you want to give them a strong start, keep a frame in the freezer for spring.

Yes, I boycott apiaries that feed sugar water, except in abnormal circumstances that wasn't due to taking too much honey in the first place.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[paiute]

the bees drink sugar water. For all I know, that happens in the US, too. As mentioned above, go to a farmer's market and buy some local honey.

Bees are fed sugar and sugar water even in small local apiaries to help replace the honey the humans are stealing from the hive.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[proca]

agreed. having no experience with beehives on my resume, I find this comment interesting.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[ShanghaiBill]

agreed. having no experience with beehives on my resume, I find this comment interesting.

Well, I am not a pro or anything. It is just a hobby. I have never sold any honey, but I do give a lot away. Even one hive produces much more than one family needs.

My mom had a few beehives when I was a kid, and everything I know about beekeeping, I learned from her. She gave the bees supplemental sugar during the winter, so I did the same. I just assumed that everyone did that.

It is a fun hobby. I very rarely get stung. The last time was several years ago. My kids enjoy helping out with the honey harvesting. We put it in jars with a chunk of honeycomb and give it as Christmas presents. You can get started for about $200 in supplies.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[amiga3D]

My understanding is that because the honey is harvested during the summer the bees need the sugar water to survive the winter season.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[hcs_$reboot]

China: the bees drink sugar water

I heard that too but could not find any relevant story about this on the Net

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[Attila Dimedici]

Most honey farmers will take out so much honey of the hives that they have to feed the bees sugar water to survive the winter.

I spoke with an bee keeper shortly after the story about the problems with feeding bees HFCS (it often contains small amounts of insecticide, which causes problems with bees navigation). His comment was that it was probably not a significant problem since most beekeepers only fed bees a small amount of sugar water in the late winter so that the bees were stronger when the first blossoms of spring happened. He fed his bees cane sugar in water in late February, early March. Based on what he said, the only reason that beekeepers in the U.S. feed their bees sugar water is so that they are stronger when the blooms of spring happen, not because they took too much honey out of the hive. Nature does not care if the hive can pollinate lots of flowers and start making large amounts of honey in the early spring, so nature does not care if it takes several weeks after the flowers start to bloom for the hive to be up to speed. Commercial beekeepers on the other hand want to get as much productivity out of the hive as they can. Which means that if they can get the hive up to mid season strength as soon as the flowers start to bloom, they can make more money. Beekeepers also tend to actually treat their hives as sort of pets (not individual bees, but the hive as a whole), feeling emotionally attached to the health of the hive. Beekeepers significantly improve the health of bee hives much like cat owners improve the lives of cats.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[Izuzan]

not really true. The beekeeper adds boxes onto the top of the hive in the summer for the bee's to fill with honey. They take these off at the end of summer leaving more than enough time for the bee's to harvest enough for winter. some dont and some do. the keeper places frames of honey in the weak hives or a big bucket of feed (sugar generally). has medication in it as well.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[Izuzan]

Doesn't work so well when the keeper has over 600 hives. there is only so much that can be done. The sugar does not impede next years harvest. i don't see how it could. my parents go around to each of the hives, check it for weight before wrapping it up for the season. if they can even barely move the hive they add what frames they can, or if the whole yard is weak they add a barrel of sugar syrup. fast food for them to use over the winter.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[rockytopchip]

Beekeeping catalogs offer quite a selection of feeders. Some companies sell high fructose corn syrup by the 55 gallon container. Most commercial beekeepers feed their bees. They also install frames in their hives with starter wax foundation. This saves the bees from having to draw out as much comb and will result in increased honey production.

I have a few beehives. Each hive gets two 10 frame deep supers. During the spring nectar flow I add shallow honey supers to each hive as required. In June/July I harvest honey and comb from the shallow honey supers. I then leave the hives alone and they have the summer and fall to prepare for winter. I don't feed my bees.

You can have a hive where you don't feed your bees and you don't provide any wax foundation. This will result in the best possible honey and comb (and possibly a healthier hive) however you won't be able to harvest very much.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[zifferent]

Boycott apiaries that feed in the winter? My wife started her first hive last spring and left plenty of honey in the hive to last all winter. Problem is the bees move only slowly about the hive and if their stored honey is off in another part of the hive, like one box down far, then the bees can use all their nearby stores and still starve with plenty of honey left in the hive. Sad to see so many dead bees, and simple to prevent by supplemental feeding throughout the winter. Often it has nothing to do with over-harvesting and more to do with hive maintenance. We now have a dead hive and about 10 frames of perfectly good honey.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[CowTipperGore]

We have about 20 hives and likewise occasionally feed sugar water, particularly during periods of limited blooms, to maintain the health of the hive. However, there is a big difference between what hobby producers and large commercial producers do. You can get a lot more honey if you feed cheap HFCS instead of relying on the fickle natural blooms. Bee keepers who care about the quality of the honey do need feed during the production of honey that will be extracted because honey made from refined white sugar is not the same as honey made from the nectar of a locust or basswood tree. Bee keepers we care only about production do indeed feed year around, and use the cheapest HFCS-based syrups they can source.

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[zifferent]

No, not even close. http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3469763&cid=42935361

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[airdweller]

Don't they sleep during winter?

Re:Not mentioned in the article...

[doctor woot]

You can get started for about $200 in supplies.

Gonna get one of these for my apartment, thanks for the link.

Ah, that explains everything

[davidwr]

illegal antibiotics and heavy metals

Now we know the real "ancient Chinese secret ingredients" in the "Chinese Miracle Honey" that promises that I'll "Never get another infection again."

At least that's what "Chromium Carl" and his predecessor, "Mercury Mike," keep saying on the infomericals.

Re:Ah, that explains everything

[LordLucless]

I don't know who Carl and Mike are, but honey has quite a few medicinal uses, including as an antiseptic. They mostly involve slathering it on your skin rather than eating it, though.

Check ingredients, too

[taz346]

In addition to buying locally produced honey, which is available in most of the U.S., people really need to be reading the ingredient labels on other foods they buy. After reading the Food Safety News report linked to in the article, I'd bet that if a product lists honey as an ingredient and is made by a huge food conglomerate, odds are the honey, or whatever it really is, came from China. And we in the U.S. really need to put some teeth in the FDA's inspection process.

Re:Check ingredients, too

[whoever57]

People need to stop buying clear honey, which cannot be traced using traditional methods. The pollen allows honey to be traced, but clear honey doesn't contain any pollen.

Re:Check ingredients, too

[cuncator]

Actually took a quick introductory beekeeping course at a local agricultural university extension here recently. One of the things they mentioned was that the Chinese were now filtering the honey to get rid of the original pollen and then putting the "correct" pollen in. So even this method isn't foolproof.

Buying local

[davidwr]

When you buy local, it tends to have a greater economic impact on your local economy than if you buy from outside your local area.

This information is useful to people who give a greater or lesser "moral weight" to supporting their local economy vs. their regional economy vs. their domestic economy vs. the world economy. Those who more strongly favor firing the economic engines of 3rd world countries than they do their domestic, regional, or local economic engine will use this information and say "Sell me that 3rd world honey, please, even if I have to pay extra." Those who favor the opposite may be willing to pay a premium - perhaps even a 100% premium - for locally grown/locally produced goods.

Re:Buying local

[turbidostato]

"Those who favor the opposite may be willing to pay a premium - perhaps even a 100% premium - for locally grown/locally produced goods."

And then (all other things being equal) what you are doing is promoting an unefficient productivity for your local economy instead of preferring the cheap products so making your local economy can focus on what it can do fine an on the bucket too.

The "all other things being equal" is of importance here. Of course you can be cheaper if you use slaverish work instead of proper wages but that's not the point. Think global instead of local, but think that the human being in the other side of the globe diserves dignity as much as your neighborough.

Re:Buying local

[Nerdfest]

People with that sort of attitude are the reason we have people selling honey laced with antibiotics and heavy metals. Screw everybody else, as long as I get ahead. Show a little social conscience.

Re:Buying local

[CowTipperGore]

Your notion might please Adam Smith but your global economy and efficiency at all costs ignores the real impacts to each and every locality. I don't find it particularly helpful to a take a self-sufficient local culture, turn them into a monoculture doing whatever one thing that the globalists find they can do the best/cheapest, and make them dependent on people on the other side of the world for something they did themselves a generation ago. There's more to life than maximizing your economic output, particularly when most of the benefit accrues to others and you've mortgaged your future to do it.

Re:Buying local

[broken_chaos]

My head hurts. You just advocated a race-to-the-bottom as being good for everyone...

Re:Buying local

[sjames]

Nah, what you're actually doing is not supporting people raking in crazy profits from the 'impedance mismatch' between economies.

A lot of the cheaper is because the workers only get paid enough to live in a shanty.

Re:Buying local

[turbidostato]

"I don't find it particularly helpful to a take a self-sufficient local culture..."

Please, define "local". Your home? your town? your county? your state? your country?

I for one want to tell "local" my planet.

Re:Buying local

[turbidostato]

"A lot of the cheaper is because the workers only get paid enough to live in a shanty."

Of course yes, and I'm completly against that, I thought it was clear in my previous message.

Re:Buying local

[sjames]

I am saying that since that is such a large component of the difference in price, local buyers are not, in fact, promoting inefficiency.

Taste varies by location

[davidwr]

Like wine and some other food products, honey CAN taste different based on the flowers the bees feed from.

"National chain" honey is likely either from the same region year after year and/or it's a blend that's controlled to ensure a consistent product from year to year.

Heck, as a consumer, if I wasn't specifically looking for "pure" honey I would expect some added ingredients, including small amounts of flavoring and cheaper sweeteners, to allow the company to sell me something that "tasted like honey" at a lower price and with greater batch-to-batch and year-to-year consistency. Then again, I'm the kind of guy who usually buys name-brand relatively cheap fizzy drinks instead of small-label, all-natural-ingredients expensive ones. But when I do buy "carbonated grape juice" I expect it to be nothing but pure carbonated grape juice.

The one thing I do demand as a food customer is an accurate label that lists all flavor-, texture-, and medically-significant ingredients (e.g. allergens, anything with nutritional value, etc.), and all non-trace ingredients.

Re:Taste varies by location

[ShanghaiBill]

Like wine and some other food products, honey CAN taste different based on the flowers the bees feed from.

Generally darker honey has a stronger flavor. Honey from white clover is very light and has a mild taste. The darkest honey that I have tasted was from buckwheat blossoms. Buckwheat honey is as dark as molasses, and the taste is fantastic. I keep a beehive in my backyard, and usually plant a patch of buckwheat just for the bees.

Re:Taste varies by location

[arth1]

Like wine and some other food products, honey CAN taste different based on the flowers the bees feed from.

Not only CAN, but DOES. In most countries, it's sold with the predominant flower type being part of the name. My preference is for ling honey, but others prefer different flavors.

Of course, in the US, that naming convention wouldn't work well -- who would buy Monsanto Roundup Ready Honey?

Re:Taste varies by location

[TubeSteak]

Plant something from the marshmallow family and you'll get honey that tastes like marshmallows.
It's really a bit crazy when you first try it.

Re:Taste varies by location

[TheLink]

It's not just flowers the bees might feed on:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/10/pictures/121011-blue-honey-honeybees-animals-science/ :)

Re:Taste varies by location

[CowTipperGore]

I likewise love dark and flavorful honey. We keep about 20 hives and always grow multiple plantings of buckwheat in the end our garden. It is especially nice in late summer when few other things are blooming. The bees have something to work and the honey is almost nothing but buckwheat.

The actual producer?

[davidwr]

They guy with all the bees is just the slave-driving middleman.

If you really want to buy from the actual producers, buy from the bees themselves. :)

Re:The actual producer?

[DKlineburg]

I would mod you up if I had funny mod points. :)

Re:The actual producer?

[tehlinux]

I buy from the head bee guy.

Re:The actual producer?

[jones_supa]

Yep, even I have only "Insightful" and "Interesting" mod points left.

Re:The actual producer?

[ColdWetDog]

I buy from the head bee guy.

Then you're doing it wrong. The head of the hive is always a queen..

Re:The actual producer?

[Russianspi]

Can't use them for this story anymore, now that you posted. Yes, I know, I know, *whoosh!*

Re:The actual producer?

[shentino]

Buzz off.

Space Industry Technology

[Infiniti2000]

Once again, space industry technology is applicable to everyday life right here on earth. Pay attention, you stupid assholes in government!

Re:Space Industry Technology

[mfwitten]

It would no doubt be much more efficient to develop "space" technology from everyday advancements, rather than to develop everyday advancements from "space" technology. This is because everyday advancements fund themselves.

Among rational people, it would be difficult to procure funding for planting an American flag on the Moon, but it would be easy to procure funding for GPS, satellite communications, asteroid mining, transportation, weather and geographical mapping, etc. These are all things that could lead to planting a flag on the Moon when it becomes inexpensive to do so through some private enterprise that already exists due to having served some directly useful purpose in people's lives.

Re:Space Industry Technology

[ridgecritter]

I think reality disagrees with you. The tech you listed was pushed into being by military, cost-is-no-object requirements. GPS happened because the US military needed a precision location system, and a space-based system was the only way to make it happen. Integrated circuits, which led to microprocessors and all the rest, happened because the US military had to miniaturize guidance and control electronics for ballistic missile systems. All of the decades of aerospace R&D which SpaceX is building upon to such good effect in reducing launch costs were undertaken by noncommercial, mostly cost-insensitive nation/state participants.

Basically, the $0.75 GPS chip in your iPhone happened in response to the prior existence of the GPS system. I doubt that Steve Jobs at his best would have been successful in persuading the US DoD to put up GPS. But with GPS already in the sky, he had a firm base on which to monetize the mass-market potential of the system (as did others - just using Jobs/iPhone as one example).

This is how it's worked over the centuries: human conflict drives development of "stuff" that ordinary consumers/businesses could never get funded through their own economic models. Then people think of wider uses for the "stuff", and (manufacturing volume + tech advance) make the capabilities cheap.

So while you may think it more efficient to have space technology develop as a consequence of everyday advancements, it seems that in fact, everyday advancements more often proceed from the incredibly expensive cutting-edge wacko development work undertaken for reasons completely outside the purview of everyday economics. I think efficiency is a complicated and subtle thing.

Re:Space Industry Technology

[mfwitten]

I made the argument that it would no doubt be much more efficient to develop "space" technology from everyday advancements.

You made the argument that everyday advancements have historically proceeded from the incredibly expensive cutting-edge wacko development work undertaken for reasons completely outside the purview of everyday economics.

I disagree, but regardless of whether you are correct, you are not arguing about the same thing.

Re:Space Industry Technology

[ridgecritter]

I do think we're talking about the same thing.

There's been a lot of opportunity for space technology to have developed from everyday advancements, rather than the reverse. That hasn't been the course of events.

When a development modality that would *seem* feasible doesn't happen despite long opportunity to do so, I start thinking maybe it really isn't as feasible - or as efficient - as what actually does occur.

Re:Space Industry Technology

[Anonymous Coward]

it would be easy to procure funding for GPS, satellite communications, asteroid mining, transportation, weather and geographical mapping, etc.

That conversation would go something like this:

Developer: I have a great idea for a satellite navigation network! Wanna give me funding.
Public: What do we care about navigating satellites?
Developer: No, it's for you! It will make navigation a breeze!
Public: So you are trying to sell us maps, we already have lots of those.
Developer: It's better than a map! It is automatic and wireless!!
Public: So it is a map that requires batteries?
Developer: Well yes, but that isn't the point! This will make your life easier! You wont have to read maps anymore!
Public: Okay it sounds promising. How much does it cost?
Developer: They will cost about $200 a unit.
Public: For a map with batteries! You have to be kidding. Is that the prototype cost?
Developer: Umm, well you see that's the thing. We can't make a prototype until we make the satellites.
Public: So do it then.
Developer: You need to give us money first.
Public: Why would we give you money to profit off us?
Developer: It is an investment!!!
Public: How much of one?
Developer: 15 Billion dollars. .....
Developer: Hello? .....

The world is full of wankers

[multiben]

Fake honey? Really? I wasn't even aware there was a fake honey underworld. I love honey and now I have to worry about whether some fuckwit has filled it with something else? Thanks alot you wankers.

Re:The world is full of wankers

[OhANameWhatName]

I wasn't even aware there was a fake honey underworld

And you're still not. UNDERSTAND?!?

Re:The world is full of wankers

[Rufus Firefly]

Wait until you Google up counterfeit olive oil...

As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[whoever57]

But seriously, don't buy clear honey. Honey can be traced by the pollen, which has been removed in clear honey.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[Demonantis]

Did you know there is an acceptable limit on the amount of bugs in chocolate? This is what happens when you distance yourself from the producer. Best case you should know who grows your food. It makes them responsible.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[arth1]

In the UK, the taboo against horse meat seems to be eroding, with increased imports and famous chefs like Gordon Ramsey serving horse meat in restaurants (but labeled as such).

Most of Europe didn't have an aversion against horse meat in the first place, and the main problem with the horse meat scandal wasn't that horse meat was sold to consumers, but that X was presented as Y.

In addition to misleading the buyers, who knows what else was wrong with it? Were the horses fit for human consumption, or horses died from disease, or race horses full of steroids? Who knows, when the paper trail can't be trusted in the first place.

I love a good horse meat salame, but I would prefer to always know what my food contains.

A 1% max contamination isn't that bad, when you're talking about abattoirs that handle several different types of animals. There may be traces of beef in your ground mutton too. Not to forget sausages. Drop the regulation against ingredients from other animals to much lower than 1%, and it would affect a lot of sausages, where the casing is often from a different animal.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you know there is an acceptable limit on the amount of bugs in chocolate? This is what happens when you distance yourself from the producer. Best case you should know who grows your food. It makes them responsible.

I beg to differ, because "responsible" is not within Monsanto's vocabulary. In fact, quite the opposite.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[anyanka]

Not to forget sausages. Drop the regulation against ingredients from other animals to much lower than 1%, and it would affect a lot of sausages, where the casing is often from a different animal.

WTF!?! Are you saying they actually stuff the meat of one animal into the intestines of another, and we're supposed to eat that? Bluergh! :P

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[amiga3D]

There is also an allowance for feces as well. I don't eat ground beef except well done.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[NitWit005]

You probably get bugs in your food pretty much regardless of what you eat. It's hard to avoid considering how small some bugs are, and the obvious tendency for them to be attracted to food, or other bugs.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[Sockatume]

Not necessarily: completely unprocessed honey can still be "clear" (as in not cloudy). This should be obvious given that it's clear when you're taking it off the honeycomb to begin with.

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[arth1]

WTF!?! Are you saying they actually stuff the meat of one animal into the intestines of another, and we're supposed to eat that? Bluergh! :P

For very liberal definitions of meat.
Or, in some cases, liberal definitions of "animal".

Re:As long as it doesn't contain horse meat ..

[Hatta]

What are you talking about? The best honey I've ever had was also the palest honey I've ever had. And yes, it was locally produced.

OT: .sig

[davidwr]

A spectre is haunting Amazon: the spectre of $0 communism [amzn.to]

Don't worry, they'll make it up in volume.

Advertising volume, that is.

Coke nothing...

[davidwr]

Wait until you find out how Slurm(TM) is made.

Re:Coke nothing...

[DKlineburg]

But I'm addicted to that, I keep slurming it down!

Re:Laser Laundering Countermeasure

[davidwr]

I tried what you said.

Now my laser is all sticky. Would laundering it help?

Not wankers

[davidwr]

This was about adulterating honey with other sweet materials or honey that is contaminated with antibiotics and heavy metals.

If a wanker is adulterating your honey, well, I think I'd rather die of heavy metal poisoning than think about what he's adulterating it with.

Sorry about the humor fail there folks

[davidwr]

I had the "deadpan" setting a bit too high. Please accept my apologies.

Re:Sorry about the humor fail there folks

[jones_supa]

This is a purely technical, fact based discussion forum. Confusing humor is recommended against in the guidelines.

Re:Sorry about the humor fail there folks

[ColdWetDog]

This is a purely technical, fact based discussion forum. Confusing humor is recommended against in the guidelines.

Good grammar, however...

Re:Sorry about the humor fail there folks

[Zontar The Mindless]

...can occasionally be heard whimpering in the night--not unlike a cold, wet dog at the door.

Food products from China?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would anyone buy a food product made in China? You can pretty much count on it containing something it shouldn't or not containing something it should. I don't even buy pans made in China, and that's a chore. Electronics ok, but anything to do with food, Chinese products are out.

Re:Food products from China?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would anyone buy a food product made in China? ... I don't even buy pans made in China ...

Its not just you. A majority of middle class and affluent Chinese consumers prefer US and European made products and food for these very same reasons. They themselves doubt the safety of their domestic products.

Re:Food products from China?

[arth1]

Its not just you. A majority of middle class and affluent Chinese consumers prefer US and European made products and food for these very same reasons. They themselves doubt the safety of their domestic products.

To a certain extent, this is true for USA too, where many people don't trust American cars or knives or whatever, and buy European products instead. Also, sections of "better" grocery stores have European food products that people buy because for perceived quality reasons, like not containing GMO food or growth hormones.
Even something as American as Coca-Cola - people buy imported Coke to avoid corn syrup, whether it's due to the taste or because they don't want to support Monsanto. Enough so that my local grocery store carries imported Coke.

Re:Food products from China?

[petermgreen]

The problem is most food products do not list the source of every ingredient so unless all you ever buy are raw unblended food products (typical "normal" honey is blended) you are probablly eating stuff from china without knowing it.

And don't forget that there are plenty of people out there who are quite prepared to lie. So even if they did mandate that food products were printed with the country of origin of every ingrediant you would have very little certainty that the list was correct.

When a naked Bar Rafaeli covered in honey

[Ukab the Great]

appears on your doorstep and wants to have mindblowing sex with you, you can zap her with a powerful mars laser, call her out as a fraud slathered in high fructose corn syrup, and send her on her way.

Re:When a naked Bar Rafaeli covered in honey

[GT66]

Bar Rafaeli should be rejected on the grounds that she is a horrible person. She avoided her military service and then agreed to do ads convincing others to join the Israeli military all while saying that. "Celebrities have different agendas." Someone like that is a despicable creature regardless of the wrapper.

Re:When a naked Bar Rafaeli (sic) covered in honey

[Anonymous Coward]

appears on your doorstep and wants to have mindblowing sex with you, you can zap her with a powerful mars laser, call her out as a fraud slathered in high fructose corn syrup, and send her on her way.

I think I'd like to zap her with my laser, if you know what I'm saying... then lick the HFCS off her!

Actually that's backwards. I'd lick the HFCS off her, THEN zap her! Repeatedly, and as often as possible. I'm getting older and takes my laser a few minutes to recharge in between... discharges, but it's still good for a bunch in a day, with proper fueling and cooling.

Sorry, what were we talking about again?

It's worth it

[Sycraft-fu]

I buy Crockett's Desert Honey since that's the local stuff here and man, so much tastier than generic clover honey. Whatever desert wildflowers the bees are snacking on, it gives it a very complex and tasty flavour. So worth the extra money.

I mean if you are using it in mass quantities, ok maybe the cost is a problem, but for normal household use a container of honey should last a reasonable amount of time (it is high calorie, you shouldn't slather it on stuff) so it really won't hit your budget that much.

You can usually find the smaller honey producers in good grocers. Crockett's is sold in Safeway in my region. Grocers often stock some local products. By the same token I can get really good local tortillas in Safeway here, since they are made here (in town in fact).

Do a bit of looking around, you probably can get local honey, you can probably get it at a convenient store, and it probably isn't too expensive.

Or go order Crockett's from their site. It really is my favourite honey I've ever had.

Re:It's worth it

[Bob the Super Hamste]

As far as finding local products at the grocery store it seems Minnesota is kind of weird. The major grocery stores don't seem to carry much (I am not talking the high end or boutique ones) yet I will find locally produced things at places like Menards (a regional chain of home improvement stores) or Fleet Farm (a regional chain like tractor supply company). When I saw honey at Fleet Farm it came in 2 varieties filtered and unfiltered both packaged in 1 quart mason jars. It listed the apiary that produced it which was located up in the Brainerd lakes region. From what I remember it didn't seem outrageously expensive (I think it was in the $10-$12 range for a quart) but then I haven't bought honey in years as one of my relatives keeps bees as a hobby in retirement and every year sends me about a gallon (4 1 quart mason jars) of honey at Christmas.

True Source Certified (TM) ?

[maxwells_deamon]

I was aware of problems with imported honey being adulterated. I know it is not an absolute guarantee but is this label a good idea for now?

OT: Fake maple syrup

[GodfatherofSoul]

There's a lot of domestic fake maple syrup, which is nothing but maple syrup-flavored corn syrup. So, don't get too nationalistic in criticizing the crap the Chinese are sending us.

BTW, I heard a year or so a go there was an effort to make a law banning selling anything not pure maple syrup as such.

Re:OT: Fake maple syrup

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Not like whoever is in charge of such things, being an evil regulatory entity, would have the staff for this; but it shouldn't be necessary to specifically ban false labelling/advertising product-by-product. Fraud is fraud.

Re:OT: Fake maple syrup

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference is that if you read the label, I'm sure the adulterated stuff lists corn syrup on the label. What Vermont considers to be fake maple syrup is generally properly labeled syrup, it just disagrees with their definition of maple syrup.

Re:OT: Fake maple syrup

[N!k0N]

Difference there is that the fake maple syrup is labelled as such ("maple flavored syrup"), usually in small letters in some otherwise unobtrusive spot on the front label, and also on the back label with the qualifier "contains x% maple syrup". We had both in my parents' house (parents liked it, kids got the cheap shit ... probably more because "little kids" + "pancakes/waffles/french toast" = "lots of wasted syrup on the plate" than anything)

Re:OT: Fake maple syrup

[WindBourne]

The fake Maple syrup is normally labeled as such. However, even the cut maple syrup will not send you to a hospital or lower your IQ 20 pts.

Re:OT: Fake maple syrup

[usuallylost]

There's a lot of domestic fake maple syrup, which is nothing but maple syrup-flavored corn syrup. So, don't get too nationalistic in criticizing the crap the Chinese are sending us.

BTW, I heard a year or so a go there was an effort to make a law banning selling anything not pure maple syrup as such.

The real answer here is that anytime there is a commodity that has significant value and a possible way to cheat somebody will do it. Whether it be substituting fake honey, fake maple syrup, or lasagne with horse meat rather than beef. Most developed countries have inspectors to try and minimize that behavior. The problem is regulation and testing regimes make the end product more expensive. So there is always a trade off where they try to have enough testing to minimize the abuse of the consumer while not driving up costs to the point that the consumer can't afford it.

How credible is this story?

[gonz]

Here is the original self-promoting story from Food Safety News:
http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2011/08/honey-laundering

However, from searching Google News (e.g. "china counterfeit honey"), the results are merely people's blogs that link to the same Food Safety News article. I'm sure FSN is providing a helpful service of raising awareness, but they are not an impartial group who we can expect to conduct a reliable investigation. Where are the confirming sources?

Their article references the FDA, the Department of Commerce, and the Department of Agriculture -- but I can't find anything on those sites to support the article's opening claim that "A third or more of all the honey consumed in the U.S. is likely to have been smuggled in from China."

Can anybody provide a citation?

Re:How credible is this story?

[bfandreas]

Well, the general angle on honey is the same in China as in everywhere else. Bees eat flowers and barf honey.

BUT given that there have been some health scares due to Chinese produced food and they are one of the biggest honey producers in the world you will have to rethink where the stuff you eat comes from. Heavy metals can be introduced in a number of ways into that eat flowers and barf honey thing.

For example pollution of the environment. Or sloppy production techniques. Or dump toxic stuff into honey because it will look prettier in the supermarket.
All these things have already happened. And some Chinese food producers(think about that willfully polluted toddler food they sold a couple of years ago) are very reckless when it comes to making a profit.

This is Gas Chromatography

[girlinatrainingbra]

This is just Gas Chromatography using a laser to turn the liquid honey specimen into vapor form to be analyzed with the chromatograph. Nothing seems new except for this specific and particular laser, which is only used as an energy and heat source to vaporize the liquid sample. Am I right?

Re:This is Gas Chromatography

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

As best I can tell, it appears to be a bit more sophisticated than that(as well as presumably smaller, if they managed to shoehorn one into a space probe):

The laser burns the sample and allows the apparatus to examine the carbon isotope ratio in the combustion products. Their commercialization partner, 'Protium', apparently makes isotope-ratio mass spectrometer gear, and this laser apparatus seems to have similar capabilities.

Re:Only stupid Usasians

[Zontar The Mindless]

I dunno about that... Not only is this an issue in Europe (where I live and buy the honey I eat), but they're also asking each other, "Eat any horseburgers lately?"

Re:Only stupid Usasians

[retchdog]

Yeah, the EU is doing a great job at food monitoring. Fucking hilarious.

Re:Need a laser to find honey?!

[retchdog]

And the hysterical idiot has an account linked to Facebook. Everyone who's surprised by this, raise your hand.

Please go back to forwarding your blithering political conspiracy spam (of whatever wing you belong to) to your relatives and ``friends.''

AU: 'Honey & Syrup' contains 60% syrup... toda

[ivi]

One of Australias' "Big 2" SuperMarket chains (ie, Coles) places Chinese-sourced "Honey & Syrup" in the middle of the rectangle of shelf-space otherwise occupied by honeys.

As "Honey" is listed first, in the product's name, I - for one - was once fooled into thinking that the product would -surely- have at least 50% honey in each plastic bottle of "Honey & Syrup," so I tracked down the Australian distributor & asked for details about the product.

(I should have generalised from what we - long ago - discovered about so-called 95 gram cans of "designer tunas" ...which turned out to contain from about 40% tuna up to slightly over 70%, depending on each can's "designer flavor.")

(The Australian importer's phone number was answered by an auto-parts company(!). Checking the phone number, it was then listed, in the phone catalog, as a car parts company.)

Assuming that the company was perhaps a rural-based operation, happy to convert some extra storage space into profits, I focused on the product's make-up, since the label did not specify the prevalence of either of the two named ingredients.

Verbally, the person at the cart parts company, who answered as importer & distributor of this product, told me that the product was 60% -syrup- & only 40% honey. As the label did not show these percentages, I couldn't help replying: "Today, maybe, but I'd almost expect the Chinese supplier to further reduce the percentage of honey it may mix in, in future, ie, to cut its cost.

Re:True Source Certified (TM) ?

[shentino]

I'd rather just say "fuck the chinese" since they're busy ripping us off six ways from sunday and take care of our own damn economy.

Given enough demand I'm sure that our local farmers can be kept busy making honey for us.

I don't think the honey is your problem

[Overzeetop]

Seriously, if you're eating at a fast food restaurant then whether you are getting genuine honey is likely to be the least of your health worries.

Re:AU: 'Honey & Syrup' contains 60% syrup... t

[Anonymous Coward]

" told me that the product was 60% -syrup- & only 40% honey. As the label did not show these percentages"

On compliant (ie: legal) food labelling in Aus:

"Ingredients must be listed in descending order (by ingoing weight). This means that when the food was manufactured, the first ingredient listed contributed the largest amount and the last ingredient listed contributed the least. For example, if sugar is listed near the start of the list the product contains a greater proportion of this ingredient."

This means that syrup should have been listed first. If this wasn't the case, false labelling of food is currently handled by the sates, please see: http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/foodstandards/foodenforcementcontacts/

It's worse than that.

[Lumpy]

Most of the honey you find that is cheap, is NOT honey but HFCS that is blended with honey. They had a big thing about that in consumer reports a couple of years ago and warned everyone away from honey that has a origin labeling that stated China or Pakastan. but it is easy to spot if you know what to look for. Blended honey is very light in color and far too clear compared to real 100% honey.

Re:You don't know how cheap US local honey is..

[Lumpy]

Not really, if y ou are silly and buy it from a large supermarket where you pay for the Botique markup? yes. but I buy 5 gallon pails of honey from local small markets or Bee keepers for about $2.00 a pound.

I make Mead, so I buy a LOT of honey. and I look for the unfiltered, the extra bee parts adds to the flavor.

I prefer the cut over the chinese

[WindBourne]

The cut stuff is simply sugar water being added. Not as bad for you. Just not what you paid for.

The real problem is that Chinese food is LOADED with heavy metals (esp. mercury) due to their pollution. It is bad enough that we are getting food using ingrediants from there, but the pure chinese honey is pretty bad. I hope that we are prosecuting those that we have found to be importing Chinese honey. As in jail time.

Re:What better way to use NASA technology

[WindBourne]

Actually, not NASA's but England's. And to be honest, space innovations do help us all over the world. Sadly, so many want to kill it off.

Re:True Source Certified (TM) ?

[WindBourne]

Keep in mind that we have an issue with coloney collapse. That is still not solved. However, I think that if we can kill off the Chinese honey (which is being dumped on the west illegally), then their will be strong incentives to get local honey right.

Gigantic surprise

[ctrlshift]

China can make something cheaper and crappier than us and we eat it right up. So much so that people think real honey is a ripoff.

Wait...isn't this just a variation on the olive oil story?

Fake Honey is Real Honey

[Anonymous Coward]

Fake honey is real honey in the US anyway. The USDA allots for a 33/66% corn syrup honey mixture to be marketed as "Real Honey"

Slashdot Education

[BoRegardless]

This discussion has been incredible. A virtual education in honey production & types plus the scammers.

It is a key reason Slashdot is in my bookmarks. I wish more news sources stuck to this mode.

You could actually do that

[phorm]

I assume your post is in jest, but supposedly there is a product that allows you to do just that.

I'd imagine that there are some maintenance, etc concerns though.

Re:test fast food first

[hcs_$reboot]

Why would mac donald honey be the only thing not to be fake?

The problem isn't antibiotics and heavy metals...

[davidwr]

The problem isn't antibiotics and heavy metals per se, it's

* Having them in amounts that are above legal limits
* Having them in amounts that are generally known to be unsafe, even absent legal regulations
* Having them in biologically significant amounts without notifying the consumer

The first is a legal problem but all are moral problems and the last two are likely health and/or environmental problems.

Trace amounts of antibiotics and heavy metals that are well below legal thresholds, below any levels known or strongly suspected to cause a safety issue, and which are either clearly labeled or which are below any levels known to be biologically significant either for the consumer or the environment (i.e. what goes down the toilet or what's left in our body when it rots away) can remain unlabeled without being a problem.

Note that "levels known to be biologically significant" may be "any measurable amount" for certain heavy metals, certain allergens, and certain chemicals that easily pass into the unborn offspring of a pregnant woman or to her child through lactation.

Re:We already eat way too much sugar and meat anyw

[GrantRobertson]

You know how it is. If you eat everything on your plate then children won't starve in Africa. If most people are overweight, then everyone should eat less because it would be politically incorrect to tell only the fat people to eat less.

re: organic food vs non-organic

[Kenneth Stephen]

There was a great episode of Bullshit which focussed on the organic food vs non-organic food topic. It turns out that most of the (superior) taste difference that people claim for organic food is psychological. For a single banana cut into half, if one piece is labelled "organic" and the other is not, people would report a better taste for the "organic" half. Now granted that Penn & Teller weren't producing a scientifically peer reviewed experiment, it still is an interesting data point. For my part, I don't see any difference whatsoever between organic and non-organic, other than that the organic stuff seems to spoil faster.

Re:Free trade only works to our benefit if it is s

[cheater512]

Thats not free trade.

Now if the US would stop buying the stuff....
But apparently there is a big demand for Chinese honey. Now *THAT* is free trade.

Clean up your own dodgy people, don't foist your rules on the Chinese. You don't have to buy their stuff in the first place.

Coffee + Honey = Ew.

[zooblethorpe]

A lot of people like their coffee sweet, and many of them put honey in their coffee. It seems to me that coffee honey in coffee would be damned good, if you like sweet coffee (I don't).

Maybe it's just my personal chemistry, but every time I've put honey in coffee, it tastes horrible . It's like there's some sort of weird chemically reaction or something that happens, like what happens when you have a sip of wine after brushing your teeth. Honey in tea is awesome, but in coffee, I've never been able to stand the resulting flavor.

Cheers,

It's all about context...

[DrStoooopid]

...if you think of Winnie the Pooh looking for the "Honey Pot" in the adult context, it makes those cartoons enjoyable a second time around.

Buy typed honey - like clover, wildflower, etc.

[captainzilog2]

Honey in the US is inspected both for it's labelled origin and content. There are 2 basic types - filtered - lightly filtered and super filtered. super-filtration removes all of the pollen particles from the honey, thus rendering it unidentifiable. Honey sold in the US as a specific type must contain a minimum amount of the pollen(s) named on the label. True, it could be diluted. The pollen can also identify the source of origin. Bees in China eat chinese plants. And these pollen particles can be identified microscopically. It's only the 'generic' superfiltered honey that is really suspect. And I would guess most of it comes from Asia where pesticide/herbicides are not as strongly regulated and it's super-filtered to conceal it's source.