manufacturing

If possible, the honey harvest should take place at the end of a honey flow period, eg after the alpine roses have bloomed. Before honey can be harvested, it must be checked whether it is ripe enough. The water content must not exceed 20%; 15 to 17% is ideal. The lower the water content, the smaller the risk that the honey will start to ferment.

The bees close the ripe honeycombs with wax caps. These lids must be removed prior to centrifuging the honey, which can be done manually or with a machine.

After centrifuging, there may still be some wax in the honey, which can be removed with two honey sieves - one coarser and one finer. The fresh honey is then left in the cauldron for a few days to remove the foam created by the rising air bubbles.

As soon as the honey has been skimmed off, it can either be poured into jars immediately or stirred mechanically. The stirring takes place after the onset of the candy and usually twice a day for five to ten minutes each time (exception: robinia/acacia honey and forest honey are not stirred). The stirring grinds away the sugar crystals in the honey, giving it a smooth, finely creamy consistency. However, this purely mechanical treatment also has a slight impact on the flavor of the honey, as does heating crystallized honey.

Important: Be careful when buying honey, because promotional practices such as heating the honey and microfiltration have a negative impact on the quality of the honey. Both serve to keep the honey on store shelves liquid for longer, but damage the valuable ingredients in the honey. Even fancy names like "noble" and "premium" don't make the honey any better. The best way to do this is to pay attention to transparent, verifiable information and products with a clear origin.

Fakes: Some bees don't see a single flower in their lifetime, but they do see plenty of sugar water. The addition of cheap extenders can further reduce production costs, and resourceful counterfeiters tinker with their honey mixtures until even laboratories can hardly distinguish them from real honey. Therefore: It is better to ask exactly where the products on offer come from, how they were manufactured and transported, whether they were treated with heat or other processes, etc.