honey
|ˈhənē| |ˌhəni|
|ˌhʌni|
noun ( pl.
-eys)
1
a
sweet, sticky, yellowish-brown fluid made by bees and other
insects from nectar collected from flowers.
•
this
substance used as food, typically as a sweetener :
his
pancake is sometimes smeared with jam or
honey.
•
a
yellowish-brown or golden color : [as adj. ]
her
honey skin.
•
any
sweet substance similar to bees' honey.
2
informal
an
excellent example of something : it's
one
honey of an
adaptation.
•
darling; sweetheart
(usually as a form of address) : hi,
honey!
ORIGIN
Old
English hunig,
of Germanic origin; related to Dutch
honig and German
Honig.
Honey is a sweet and viscous fluid produced by honey bees
from the nectar of flowers. "The definition of honey
stipulates a pure product that does not allow for the
addition of any other substance. This includes, but is not
limited to, water or other sweeteners," according to the
United States National Honey Board 2003 and other nations'
food regulations. This article refers exclusively to the
honey produced by honey bees (the genus Apis); honey
produced by other bees or other insects has very different
properties.
Honey is significantly sweeter than table sugar and has
attractive chemical properties for baking. Honey has a
distinctive flavor which leads some people to prefer it
over sugar and other sweeteners.
Liquid honey does not spoil. Because of its high sugar
concentration, it kills most bacteria by crenation. Natural
airborne yeasts cannot become active in it because the
moisture content is too low. Natural, raw honey varies from
14% to 18% moisture content. As long as the moisture
content remains under 18%, virtually no organism can
successfully multiply to significant amounts in honey,
though, importantly, enough bacteria survive to make honey
dangerous for infants (especially Clostridium botulinum).
The study of pollens and spores in raw honey
(melissopalynology) can determine floral sources of honey.
Because bees carry an electrostatic charge, and can attract
other particles, the same techniques of melissopalynology
can be used in area environmental studies of radioactive
particles, dust, or particulate pollution.
A main effect of bees collecting nectar to make honey is
pollination, which is crucial for flowering plants.
Composition of honey
Honey is a mixture of sugars and other compounds. With
respect to carbohydrates, honey is mainly fructose (about
38.5 percent) and glucose (about 31.0 percent). The
remaining carbohydrates include maltose, sucrose and other
complex carbohydrates. In addition, honey contains a wide
array of vitamins, such as vitamin B6 , thiamin, niacin,
riboflavin and pantothenic acid. Essential minerals
including calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese,
phosphorus, potassium, sodium and zinc as well as several
different amino acids have been identified in honey. (Honey
also contains several compounds which function as
antioxidants. Known antioxidant compounds in honey are
chrysin, pinobanksin, vitamin C, catalase and pinocembrin.
Unlike most other sweeteners, honey contains small amounts
of a wide array of vitamins, minerals, amino acids and
antioxidants.
The specific composition of any batch of honey will depend
largely on the mix of flowers consumed by the bees that
produced the honey. Honey has a density of about 1.5
kg/liter (50% denser than water) or 12.5 pounds per US
gallon.
Typical honey analysis
* Fructose: 38%
* Glucose: 31%
* Sucrose: 1%
* Water: 17%
* Other sugars: 9% (maltose, melezitose)
* Ash: 0.17%
Source: Sugar Alliance
The analysis of the sugar content of honey is used for
detecting adulteration.
The information on this page has been
reproduced from www.wikipedia.com. Copyright
acknowledged.