Another reason to be careful with store-bought honey
- Thread starter wowbagger
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Hasn't this been going on for sometime now?
I'm not a chemist or whatever but wouldn't fine filtering remove bad stuff as well as pollen? I'm not saying this illegal honey is ok but posing a question.
I really wish there were good bee keepers near me so I wouldn't have to think of spending tones of money on bulk shipping...
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I'm not a chemist or whatever but wouldn't fine filtering remove bad stuff as well as pollen? I'm not saying this illegal honey is ok but posing a question.
I really wish there were good bee keepers near me so I wouldn't have to think of spending tones of money on bulk shipping...
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These are the one in western, PA
Hickory, Pa http://bedillionhoneyfarm.com/
Somerset, PA http://www.bumbleberryfarms.com/
Whitehall, PA http://www.mondjackapiaries.com/Pages/default.aspx
Hope one of these is nearby
it won't be fine fine enough to get be able to remove yeast or bacteria. mind you the amount heat applied to it will have killed anything living in it.
i would still be worried about antibiotics and other drugs (they have used ones that can kill people).
wow, those are some great resources for local honey.
one of the things that has been said is that honey is an expensive sugar to ferment. thus, people may want to get the "biggest bang for their buck". if i can buy 8 oz of honey at 3-4 bucks or "bulk" 5 lbs at 9.89 or 60 at 115...many would go for the cheaper product.
but then again, there are those who are dedicated and realize that 140 for their local beekeeper is better than 115 to some "unknown bulk corporate monster".
i also believe there is a "fair" markup for local goods. would you pay 300% more just because an item is local (all other things being equal, same pollen type/content, no antibiotics etc)? what about 150% more?
now what if the local is different (no chemicals, etc) is 300% better? 500%? i think it is a fascinating economic study.
one of the things that has been said is that honey is an expensive sugar to ferment. thus, people may want to get the "biggest bang for their buck". if i can buy 8 oz of honey at 3-4 bucks or "bulk" 5 lbs at 9.89 or 60 at 115...many would go for the cheaper product.
but then again, there are those who are dedicated and realize that 140 for their local beekeeper is better than 115 to some "unknown bulk corporate monster".
i also believe there is a "fair" markup for local goods. would you pay 300% more just because an item is local (all other things being equal, same pollen type/content, no antibiotics etc)? what about 150% more?
now what if the local is different (no chemicals, etc) is 300% better? 500%? i think it is a fascinating economic study.
Well, case in point, my 9 lb of fresh local strawberries that I picked myself for my strawberry wine last year probably cost me about $20-30... when I can get imported California strawberries for a buck a pound... although there's no comparison as to the taste, even if the CA strawberries stay good in the fridge for longer than two days.
But then again, a lot of American and Mexican produce is cheaper than local even when it's in season, which really irritates me, but I like to think that at least our farmers get paid something. Then again, we pay more for everything up here anyway. Apparently this summer, gas is supposed to go down to $1.10 per litre (that'd be $4.16/gal I think?) And we make the stuff here. Oh, and books... we still pay about 20% more for books, even when our dollars are at parity and even though most American books are printed in Canada anyway!
However, that's all corporate BS from big companies and has very little to do with anything we can change... And I will continue paying my $93/30 lb honey price to my local apiary rather than getting processed to death el-cheapo honey at the bulk store for $.50 less per lb, and I'll still buy my ever so tasty overpriced strawberries...
50 cents cheaper is what? about 17% cheaper? or a 19% markup? so really 20% doesn't seem that bad.
but would it ever get to a point where you wouldn't buy local? what if 30 lbs was say...$450? or would you just not make mead? not saying you are right or wrong, just where your values lie. totally respectable.
the more i think about it, the more i'd love to have a more "local" economy but it won't happen because my $1 means nothing to the 20,000 other people with $1 as well.
I never worked it out, but I suspect I could order imported cheapo honey from somewhere for cheaper than I get it at the bulk food store, and I could pay a LOT more for good honey than I do at my apiary (where I'm already getting their best price). A little 1-lb jar of a really nice local varietal honey from another nearby apiary is about $8, although I haven't talked to them yet about bulk discount because I have no money anyway.
But Mexican or US tomatoes are $.99 a pound and most of the time even the local hothouse stuff is $1.50/lb. I do my best to buy local, but I'd never taste a citrus fruit again if I were a rigid localvore. I do pay a little more for local when I can afford it. And when I can't, I get whatever I can get for whatever I have, I've still got to eat. And if 30 lbs of honey were $450, I'd go non-local, and if I couldn't do better than that, I'd either look into keeping my own bees or I'd just not make mead unless I was doing really, really well financially.
i guess that was where i was going. we all have that set of criteria for what we love. to some, the fact they can save $0.0001 per lb of honey outweights the fact they could either keep bees at home, buy local, buy mass produced, drug polluted, whatever crap.
crazy isn't it?
Thanks CG for the lovely chat. i haven't been able to get to the forums in a long time.
I get my honey for free. I'm restricted to clover, and it's from a corporate supplier, but when you can get 24lbs of honey FREE (as I just did for my recent batches), you're not gonna not. Amiright? ;D
I think we'd all like to know the secret to this free honey you speak of.
'Cuz free stuff is great and free stuff I actually want is AWESOME.
What's the story with e-books there? Is it only the tree-based books that cost more?
As for the honey, it seems to me you're getting a pretty sweet (pun intended) deal.
The Mexican/Californian fruits are bred for looks and for how well they travel. If you want a tomato that TASTES like a tomato, grow your own or get it at the farmer's market.
Personally I hate tomatoes, and I'm happy with the tasteless ones, but I'll still go for the tasteless CANADIAN-grown hothouse crap tomatoes over the imported ones...
I'm not sure about e-books. Although I'm pretty sure I've heard of cases where the dead-tree format was cheaper than the e-format, I have never actually paid for an e-book, a friend sold me hers pre-loaded and I'm still not done reading everything I want there...
Yeah, just over $3.00 per lb isn't a bad bulk price, but I do regularly hear of people on here getting a 50 lb pail for what I pay for a 30 lb pail.
I'm just hoping that a friend of a friend who happens to have bees likes my mead enough that he'll give me honey for a % of the finished product or something, apparently he sold 50 lb to a large apiary last year. Really nice local wildflower honey, great on toast ;D
that kinda depends on where you are... You *can* get bulk honey here in the Philippines cheaply. However, most bulk honey you get at local (not supermarkets) stores is maybe 25% honey and 75% water... So where I am, I'd rather pay the price -- seeing that I'm sure what I'm fermenting is really honey.
There was even a scam here where people were selling so-called "green" honey, supposedly because it contains chlorophyll. It turned out to be sugar-water with green food coloring.
