You ask, we answer
No one knows honey better than our bees, but we’ve also gained some experience over the last 90 years. Here are our answers to the most frequently asked questions.
Do you have more questions? Feel free to write us and ask away!
Frequently asked questions
- What’s the difference between fluid and creamy honey?
The consistency of honey mainly depends on the composition of the natural sugars it contains and their ratio to the volume. If a honey has a lot of fructose, it stays fluid longer. However, if it contains more glucose, it will crystallize early after harvesting, which makes it creamy.
- How long can honey be kept?
If you store it correctly (see storage instructions), honey can be kept indefinitely. Honey has even been found in burial grounds within Egyptian pyramids from the year 3200 B.C. and is still edible today. However, if it is stored incorrectly or for too long, it loses some of its nutritious content.
- How do you recommend storing honey?
Honey should be stored at room temperature away from direct sunlight. Since honey will quickly absorb extraneous odours and water (it’s hygroscopic), it is best stored in a tightly closed glass container.
- How can honey be made fluid after it crystallizes?
Over time, stored honey will crystallize and become solid. This is a natural process that has no effect on the quality. However, if you prefer your honey fluid, just warm it up carefully in a bowl of water. Make sure that the temperature does not exceed 40°C, so that you don’t damage the heat-sensitive content of the honey.
- How much do bees have to work to produce 1 kg of honey?
A bee has to collect about 3 kg of nectar to produce 1 kg of honey. To gather this much nectar, a bee has to visit up to 15 million blossoms, which means flying about 160,000 kilometers. In other words, a bee basically flies around the earth four times.
- How can a beekeeper harvest single-source honey?
Bees will continue to gather nectar or honeydew from the same type of plant until they can’t find any more of them. It’s because of this consistency that honey farms can harvest single-source honey, such as lavender honey or acacia blossom honey. If they want to harvest lavender honey, the beekeepers place their beehives in large lavender fields. They watch the bees and they can recognize from their “pollen baskets” whether they’ve actually flown to the desired plants. There are specific pollen analysis techniques used to check whether honey is actually from a single source.
- Is honey healthier than sugar?
Honey is 80% sugar, though it primarily consists of natural, nutritious glucose and fructose. These are absorbed easily into the blood and quickly converted into energy. Unlike conventional, refined household sugar, honey also contains some proteins, minerals and small amounts of vitamins. In particular, the enzymes and inhibins in honey make it a particularly nutritious sweetener.
- From what age can children and infants eat honey?
Children of one year or older can enjoy honey without any problems. The intestinal flora and thus the immune system of children under one is not fully developed. Since honey is a product consumed in its natural state, it may, like other uncooked foods, in rare cases contain traces of Clostridium botulinum, which appears everywhere in our environment. These bacteria spores, which are harmless to adults, can cause toxic infant botulism in infants. That’s why children under 12 months of age should not be fed any honey as a precaution.
- What is Langnese honey made of?
Langnese honey is a 100% purely natural product, an untreated food as made by the bees. Langnese honey is filled into the jars just as it is, without adding or removing anything. The German Honey Ordinance stipulates this and as a brand-name, we naturally observe the law.
- How do I use the Langnese Bee Easy?
We recommend always holding the Bee Easy honey dispenser in a vertical position. This ensures that the seal remains clean right up to the last drop and the honey goes where it’s supposed to without having to spread it. We also recommend keeping the opening clean and removing any honey residue below the cap, so that the cap doesn’t get sticky. After you squeeze the Bee Easy, let some air back into the dispenser until it returns to its original shape before closing it. Otherwise the mechanism will no longer work and you won’t be able to squeeze out any more honey.
- Why do I have sugar crystals in my honey?
Please note that the phenome of crystallization is a natural process of honey.
Almost every liquid honey has the natural tendency to crystallize. For most honeys the state of their thermodynamic equilibrium is the crystallized state. Depending on the rate of formation and growth of crystals in honey, it may take several weeks or months until the first crystals are visible. The velocity of crystallization depends on several parameters like floral origin, storage temperature, the presence of crystallization starters ( e.g. pollen) and others.
Thus, the process of crystallization as a natural phenomenom cannot be technically prevented in an all-natural honey, the velocity, however, can be influenced partictularly by the storage conditions ( constant temperature 18°C – 22°C) in a dry and dark place. (at temperatures above 25°C the honey may darken). Lower temperatures will increase the process of crystallization. Temperatures of 14°C or less are the basis for honey to crystallize faster.
- What is the difference between the German and international portfolio?
The different portfolios offered by Langnese Honey stem from the various requirements of consumers and/or governmental requirements.
The international portfolio has been specially created to satisfy the demands of our valued customers throughout the world outside Germany, Europe and the USA, taking the different climate and transport conditions into consideration.
- Does a different honey portfolio mean different honey quality?
Langnese Honey guarantees a high premium quality for all the different portfolios.
- Which honey is best for people with diabetes?
As a food producer we are not allowed to claim any health benefits for our products. If you have any questions about treating diabetes or any other disease, you are kindly advised to contact your doctor. Thank you for your understanding.
100% pure, natural honey
According to the German Honey Directive from December 16th, 1976 (updated in 2004 and 2007) honey may not contain any other substance but honey. It is also defined that no constituent particular to honey may be removed from it, such as pollen. Taking into account the latest scientific findings and using modern technology, Langnese honey not only meets the legal minimum requirements, but exceeds them and therefore guarantees 100% pure, natural honey.
Honey is harvested from the honey comb using a centrifuge. In this initial step, small particles of beeswax stay in the honey. In order to remove the wax, the honey is then strained through a sieve of stainless steel, producing a pure, natural honey. Pollen is much finer than the mesh, so the pollen go through and remain part of the honey, as declared in the German Honey Directive. Because pollen is traceable to the floral source, pollen in honey works like a fingerprint, allowing to determine the origin and type of honey.
We guarantee that our Langnese honey is not pasteurized. In order to achieve a better fluidity for the filling process, the honey is only gently warmed. The Langnese method, using as little heat as possible, demonstrates the care taken to provide a natural honey experience to consumers. By the way: even bees in their hive will reheat their honey if it freezes during winter and will feed off their combs.
As honey is a natural product and nothing is added or removed from it, it is gluten-free.
Honey is not digested by bees; therefore it is not a product of the bee itself. After collecting nectar from flowers, bees store and transport the nectar in their honey sac where the nectar is broken down and transformed into honey by enzymes. In the hives the bees store it in the honeycomb.
The Langnese kosher-certificate can be viewed on request.
Honey comes directly from nature.
Sun-kissed landscapes, shady forests or fields of glowing yellow rapeseed – honey has as many varieties as there are regions.
It is the art of combining the best honeys into a completely unique taste experience that has brought the Langnese summer blossom its fame. The Langnese “honey taster”, an expert in creating the best honeys, knows every variety, its characteristics and its taste. He uses this knowledge, his finely tuned senses and great care every day in creating a honey unmatched anywhere. Naturally, the path to this honey begins with the busy bees that fly from blossom to blossom.
Busy as a Bee
The basic substance of honey literally flows from the hard work of the bees. Langnese later combines the individual honeys into different honey varieties such as Langnese Summer Blossom Honey. The result is balanced honey compositions that guarantee uniform quality of taste, color and consistency.
About 20,000 honeybee flights go into one 150-gram jar of honey. Every day, one bee makes about 40 trips, stopping at nearly 4,000 blossoms. As it does so, it collects not only nectar but also honeydew, a sweet substance discharged by various insects – particularly in forests. Back in the hive, the nectar or honeydew is stored in honeycombs and enriched with precious enzymes. This is the story of the honey we know so well: golden yellow and a delight – and not just at breakfast time.
The Honeybee Colony
A bee colony is a complex community containing up to 80,000 bees. Every bee has its own clear role in the colony. The queen is the ruler of the bee colony. She is bigger than the other bees and is responsible for reproduction. The worker bee is in charge of the welfare of the queen and her offspring and, as a building bee, helps to expand the hive. The guard bee watches over the hive and later on, as a forager bee, also collects nectar and honeydew. All bees are female except for the drones, which have no stingers and exist only for propagation. After they mate, they die – all other drones that did not mate are driven out of the hive.
When the wax cap of the honeycombs is sealed and slightly depressed, we know that the honey is ripe – now the harvest can begin. The beekeeper “uncaps” the combs with a special tool, naturally leaving a portion of the honey in the hive for the bees so that they do not starve. The full combs are then spun in a centrifuge so that the honey is extracted from the combs and flows into a collection vessel.
Components of Honey
It is the interplay between the many components that makes honey so nutritious. In truth, the whole is more than the sum of its parts. Not only does honey taste good, its beneficial ingredients make it a valuable household product and an aid in treating all kinds of illnesses.
So far, 24 different sugars and another 180 associated materials have been found in honey. But honey is more than just honey. The concentrations of the individual components vary according to plant, climate and season. Honey contains the following components:
Sugar: Roughly 80% of honey is composed of various types of sugars.
Water: According to the German Honey Directive, only a water content of between 16% and 21% is allowed.
Co-formulants: These substances control the entire metabolic process in the human body.
History of Honey
Bees have been on our planet for 40 million to 50 million years, as we know from discoveries in amber. By comparison, humans have only been on Earth for the last 200,000 years, and discovered fire and honey 40,000 years ago. Over the centuries, honey has been prized and mythologized in many cultures, such as Ancient Egypt and among the Greeks, Romans and Germanic peoples. At times it was even referred to as the “food of the gods”. The Ancient Greeks valued honey as a cosmetic and medicinal substance. At the Olympic Games, the athletes drank honey water to regain their strength quickly.
Charlemagne later gave beekeeping a major boost: He decreed that every farm must have a beekeeper and a mead brewer, who made honey wine. Even the church was a zealous promoter of beekeeping, because beehives supplied the wax for candles.