Whats Wrong With My Honey?

madurobob

Philosopher
madurobob
Joined
Jul 20, 2007
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Its all goopy and crystallized!

Decades ago I was a beekeeper. I had ten hives and bottled and sold many, many quarts of honey twice a year. We always had honey in the pantry and some of it would be years old, but you couldn't tell by looking at it or tasting it. It might pour a little slower in January than in July, but the color, taste and texture was pretty consistent (but for the differences in nectar at different times of the year). I never strained, filtered or pasteurized my honey, it was stored and used "raw".

Well, the honey I buy at the store these days is a different beast. Its happened twice now with two different brands; one a generic brand from Costco and one an "organic" label from Whole Foods. About two weeks after I first open the quart container the honey begins to crystallize. These are quart sized plastic squeeze bottles, same as used for ketchup. They seal pretty well with a flip top and they stand lid-down on the shelf.

Now, I'm a pretty strong guy, but its damn hard even for me to get the honey out once its started crystallizing. It comes out like playdoh!

Is there a demon spirit in my pantry causing my honey to crystallize so quickly? Or, is it just the sorry state of honey being created these days by lazy, overpaid union bees?
 
I had no idea that this was not just what honey does. Interesting
 
Couldn't say what causes it to crystallize faster than your 'homebrew', but microwaving the honey for just a few seconds, still in the squeeze bottle, melts it nicely again and it stays runny for another week or two, in my experience.

Purely speculatively, I'd be inclined to think the commercial honey has had some of the water removed during processing...
 
Probably just the plastic filler put in to bulk up the minimum amount of honey when it's bottled in China reacting to the non-polluted air here in the States.
 
Hmmm.. less water... that could be part of it. My house is fairly dry in the winter, too. So, the honey could be losing moisture quickly even though the lid is closed. I should buy two quarts and leave one unopened to see if there is a difference.
 
My understanding is that it's the cold that does it. If you warm the honey it goes back to normal, have you tried warming the plastic bottle under the hot faucet or putting it in a warm cloth?
 
I Ratant said:
Probably just the plastic filler put in to bulk up the minimum amount of honey when it's bottled in China reacting to the non-polluted air here in the States.
Click to expand...

Y'know, I did just check the latest bottle from Whole Foods - "Product of Brazil".

Hmmmm.....
 
tkingdoll said:
My understanding is that it's the cold that does it. If you warm the honey it goes back to normal, have you tried warming the plastic bottle under the hot faucet or putting it in a warm cloth?
Click to expand...

Oh yes, as big-E suggests. it clears up in the microwave or in a pot of hot water, but not for long. Perhaps a day, day and a half. So, I can get around having to pop a vein trying to squeeze it out in its crystallized form, but its still perplexing that it crystallizes so quickly.

But, from the responses so far, perhaps its not out of the ordinary to crystallize that fast.

My pantry is a steady 65 degrees throughout the winter. I guess that could be part of the problem, too. Maybe I should find a warmer place to store the honey (on top of teh fridge?).
 
If you are worried about micro-waving plastic, just put the bottle in container of hot water from the tap. I have found that this works quite well.

More than you ever wanted to know about crystallized honey:
http://www.honey.com/downloads/crystallization.pdf.

What is crystallized honey?
Honey sometimes takes on a semi-solid state known as crystallized or granulated honey. This natural phenomenon happens when glucose, one of three main sugars in honey, spontaneously precipitates out of the supersaturated honey solution. The glucose loses water (becoming glucose monohydrate) and takes the form of a crystal (a solid body with
a precise and orderly structure).

The crystals form a lattice which immobilizes other components of honey in a suspension thus creating the semi-solid state.
Click to expand...

Enjoy! ;)
 
madurobob said:
Hmmm.. less water... that could be part of it. My house is fairly dry in the winter, too. So, the honey could be losing moisture quickly even though the lid is closed. I should buy two quarts and leave one unopened to see if there is a difference.
Click to expand...

My understanding that the honey absorbs the water and makes the crystals, if you heat it in a galss jar in a an of water (IE a double boiler situation), then as the honey ehats up it expesses the water, the crystals disappear and the honey is 'clarified', assuming that there is now ax in it. Honey crystalizes in exposure to moisture.

ETA:

I am wrong wrong wrong:
http://scienceline.org/2007/04/09/ask-westly-crystallizedhoney/
 
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Honey is a highly concentrated sugar solution. I'm not sure of all the constituents in it, but my guess is it's normally close (if not over) supersaturation.

If it's at super saturation, it can stay in solution indefinitely until a seed crystal is introduced or formed. Once that crystal is there, you can actually watch the crystals grow. My guess is when you open your jar, the shock and the dropping of crystals from the lid kick start the crystalization process.


Now, why would your honey not do this?
Well, it could be that your honey isn't as concentration (hence not at supersaturation), or it could be that your honey has a different sugar make up than thiers. Perhaps they add some table sugar to reduce the cost of the final product. A switch in the sugar composition can easily (and expectedly) change the phase behavior of the final product.


But as has been mentioned, heating it all back up should put it back into the liquid state. If you are concerned over the microwave, I suggest getting a pot of water, and heating up the entire content at ~40-60ºC. Microwave is easy, but can result in hot spots which will denature local protein and potentially make the honey taste "off".

Just my suggestions.
 
tkingdoll said:
My understanding is that it's the cold that does it. If you warm the honey it goes back to normal, have you tried warming the plastic bottle under the hot faucet or putting it in a warm cloth?
Click to expand...

Yes, shrinkage is usually the problem.
 
As joobz points out, it's not a loss or absorption of water that makes honey crystallize, it's just that honey is a supersaturated solution of sugars. The tendency of honey to crystallize will depend on the presence of seed crystals, the viscosity (if you add water, it may actually be more likely to crystallize due to the lower viscosity!), and the particular kinds of sugar (glucose, sucrose, fructose) in the honey (or, rather, the exact proportions of these sugars).

Just heat that sucker up in a pan of hot water.
 
Madalch said:
The tendency of honey to crystallize will depend on the presence of seed crystals, the viscosity (if you add water, it may actually be more likely to crystallize due to the lower viscosity!)
Click to expand...
Excellent point!
It's another example of the difference between kinetics and Equilibrium.

just because the crystalline form is has the lowest free energy and is where thermodynamics wants to be, that doesn't mean that's the state it in. Kinetically, if the molecules simply can't Diffusive to eachother to permit crystal growth, then you may never get there.

Now, this effect doesn't just occur in honey, it's actually one of the reasons why medicine tablets have a shelf life. The drug inside the tablet can change it's crystal structure (or form crystals) INSIDE the solid pill. Once the crystals form, they are difficult to redisolve in the stomach/intestine. As such, the drug is never absorbed and you don't get the dose you were supposed to.
 
Is it true that honey never goes bad? I've heard tales about archaeologists
eating 1,000 year old honey for breakfast at a dig site.
 
TX50 said:
Is it true that honey never goes bad? I've heard tales about archaeologists
eating 1,000 year old honey for breakfast at a dig site.
Click to expand...
I don't doubt it. There's not enough water in it for bacteria to survive in it- they shrivel up due to osmosis.

Now, if you add water to your honey (possibly because you think that it's drying up and crystallizing), you might dilute it enough that it becomes survivable. If you're very lucky, some wild yeasts will start turning it into mead for you; if you're not, it will go bad.
 
:) I knew the SM&T forum was the right place to get good answers!

So, am I correct in assuming that it could be the honey I made (stole from those that made it) decades ago lasted years on the shelf without crystallizing because it had a different sugar makeup than the honey I buy at the store today? Perhaps the commercial honey comes from bees in specific locations gathering nectar and pollen from plants that are themselves naturally sweeter, making the commercial honey sweeter and more marketable?

So, I'm a victim of the world's sweet tooth?
 
Madalch said:
The tendency of honey to crystallize will depend on the presence of seed crystals...
Click to expand...
That is why, I believe, commercial honey is heavily filtered - to remove tiny bits of beeswax and other things that might seed crystal growth. That's part of why I am surprised my "raw" honey lasted so long compared to the commercial stuff I buy today.
 
madurobob said:
:) I knew the SM&T forum was the right place to get good answers!

So, am I correct in assuming that it could be the honey I made (stole from those that made it) decades ago lasted years on the shelf without crystallizing because it had a different sugar makeup than the honey I buy at the store today? Perhaps the commercial honey comes from bees in specific locations gathering nectar and pollen from plants that are themselves naturally sweeter, making the commercial honey sweeter and more marketable?

So, I'm a victim of the world's sweet tooth?
Click to expand...
Yes.
Or it may be that raw honey is more stable and the filtered honey obtained from the store is less stable.
 
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