Ancient and mysterious, honey has long been celebrated as being a nectar of the Gods. Sadly, the honey jars on our supermarket shelves today don’t always bear a lot of resemblance to the honey harvested thousands of years ago. Many of today’s commercially available honey is often processed, blended and heated, stripping it of many of its vital nutrients.
Fortunately, as we learn more about the impact of processing honey, a global movement is taking place in the world of food which puts prominence on single-origin, place-centric sourcing of honey.
Single flower honey, known as Monofloral honey differ from multi floral or honeys from various flowers, by the predominance of nectar collected from a single type of plant.
Monofloral honey is the result of two conditions.
- First, the target plant must predominate so the bees have little choice of plants.
- Second, the beekeeper must time the introduction of the hive and the actual harvesting of the comb to coincide with the blooming period. This is done by carefully observing the blooming period of the chosen plant as well as possible overlapping blooming periods of other nectar-producing plants as well.
Each type of monofloral honey is a natural reduction of the nectar of its corresponding flower or plant. Monofloral honey is beautiful when done right. The flowers blooming in a specific region and environmental conditions in a certain year are all reflected in the flavour, viscosity, aromatics, and vibrant colour of honey.
The health benefits of good honey are substantial ranging from allergy prevention and immunity boosting to acting as a cough suppressant and even aiding with skincare. But when we say ‘good honey’ we mean raw, unfiltered honey.
If the honey is local and monofloral yet highly filtered and processed, its phytonutrients are largely eliminated. In order to experience its true health benefits, honey must be raw and unfiltered.
The processing of honey often removes many of the phytonutrients found in raw honey, as it exists in the hive. Raw honey, for example, contains pollen and small amounts of the same resins found in propolis. Propolis is a complex mixture of resins and other substances that honeybees use to seal the hive and make it safe from bacteria and other microorganisms.
When raw honey is extensively processed and heated what you get is a sterile sweetener—still natural and low-glycemic, but missing many benefits of raw honey.
QNet sources some incredible Jamun, Eucalyptus and Indian Laurel monofloral honeys for our Nutriplus Busy Bee range from rural farmers and cooperatives that support local communities through beekeeping.
Nutriplus Busy Bee honeys are never heated beyond the temperature of the beehive. The honey in this range contains 22 amino acids, 27 minerals including Calcium, Iron, Zinc, Potassium, c, Magnesium, and even Selenium. It is also full of vitamins such as B Pyridoxine, Thiamin, Riboflavin, Pantothenic acid, and Niacin.
More importantly, the Busy Bee range is unprocessed, 100% natural, pure, and unpasteurised.
