If you look around in the shop, you will see there are different kinds of honey.

 

 Sometimes the honey is solid and sometimes it is liquid.  

 

You can also see various names on the honey: “clover”, for example, or “mountain honey”.

 

 

What's the difference between them?

 

 

Solid and liquid honey are therefore equally natural and nutritious.

 

 

Honey of one flower or of different flowers.  We now know that honey is produced from nectar and that nectar is collected from flowers. It is therefore understandable that honey tastes and smells a bit like the flowers it originates from. 

 
If the bees only visited one type of flowers because there were no other types in the vicinity of the hive, the honey will always have the odour and flavour of that type of flowers. If lime trees flourish in spring and if there is a beehive located among these lime trees, the honey originating from these trees will taste of lime. The honey is then called: lime honey. The name of the flower is written on the packaging.

 

If the hives were located in the mountains and the honey is made of flowers which only grow in the mountains, it will be called “mountain honey”. The name of the location is written on the packaging.

If the bees made the honey from the nectar of several flowers, the packaging will simply mention “honey”.

 

Colour and flavour of honey. We now know that not all honey tastes the same because it does not always originate from the same flowers.  We therefore have honey with a mild and with a strong flavour. And the colour of honey differs as well. It ranges from light, almost white honey to dark, almost black honey.

 

Light honey normally has a mild flavour while dark honey normally has a strong flavour.

 

Spreadability of honey.  If we want to spread honey on bread, we usually opt for solid honey.  In this case it is important that the honey is not too solid and that it spreads easily even on fresh bread.

 

That is why the honey makers have to ensure that the honey is “finely crystallised”. This means that the originally liquid honey crystallises in very small fine crystals, not in large coarse crystals which are hard and unpleasant to eat.

 

Good delicious solid natural honey is crystallised so finely that it spreads like butter.

 

 

Tips and facts about honey

 

§         Crystallised honey will become liquid again if it is placed in hot water for a certain period of time.

 

§         A brown layer may develop on top of solid honey after a while. This layer is nothing but      melted honey because the jar got too warm.  The honey can still be used, just mix everything together.  

 

§         Sometimes you can see white spots and stripes on the side of a jar of solid honey. It looks like mould. This is nothing but an error in the crystalline structure.  There is nothing wrong with the honey; at the worst, it may be a bit hard and difficult to spread.  

 

§         Minerals contained in the honey may give the tea in which you poured some honey a dark colour.  Add a drop of lemon juice to the tea and it will become clear again.