Producer’s List

Are you an SBDC member and would like to post your information on these lists? Then click here for a Permission to Post form, fill it out, sign it and mail it to the SBDC office. Are you a non-SBDC beekeeper who would like to post your information on these lists? Then that’s one more good reason to join the SBDC! Click here for a Membership form and Permission to Post form, fill them out, mail them and your cheque to the SBDC office.

Honey has been a staple of the kitchen for centuries. It is a natural substance produced by honeybees, Apis mellifera, in almost every country in the world. Honey is essentially a concentrated aqueous solution of inverted sugar, namely fructose and glucose, but it also contains a very complex mixture of other saccharides, enzymes, amino and organic acids, polyphenols, carotenoid-like substances, Mallaird reaction products, vitamins, and minerals (Gheldof, Wang and Engeseth, 2002).

Honey contains about 181 substances (Al-Manary et al., 2002), including sugars, proteins, water, vitamins, minerals, hydroxymethyfurfural (HMF), enzymes, flavonoids, phenolic acids, volatile compounds, and so on. However, the main constituents of honey (as previously stated) are glucose and fructose, water, maltose, sucrose, mineral matter and proteins. The specific composition of any batch of honey will depend largely on the floral source available to the bees that produced the honey.