Natural honey is brewed by bees collecting nectar. They come from the inner or outer nectaries of plants. Generally speaking, the honey we are talking about is natural honey, and because it comes from different honey source plants, it can be divided into various single honey sources with a certain flowering period as the main body, such as linden honey, litchi honey, locust honey, Chinese milk vetch honey, rape honey, jujube honey, wild osmanthus honey, longan honey and wild chrysanthemum honey.

Although bees only collect nectar from one plant at a time, most honey often contains pollen or nectar from several plants. For example, longan is followed by Chinese milk vetch at the end of litchi flower, and Chinese milk vetch is followed by Chinese milk vetch at the end of rape flower, so longan nectar must contain litchi honey, and Chinese milk vetch must contain a small amount of rape nectar at the beginning of nectar flow. Generally speaking, honey is named after flowers from one or several major sources. Generally speaking, a single nectar is the pollen proportion of nectar source plants, which is absolutely dominant. For example, in linden honey in the northeast, Tilia amurensis pollen should be absolutely dominant, and its honey color is white and moist. But there are also many honey obtained by plants that bloom at the same time, because it has more than two kinds of pollen mixed together, which is generally called hybrid nectar or "hundred flowers" honey.

Before people knew about honey plants, honey was divided into spring honey, summer honey, autumn honey and winter honey only according to the production season.

Mannan honey

Mannan honey is honey collected by bees from the leaves or stems of plants or the metabolite of insects-honey brewed by nectar. Aphids absorb the juice of plants through the digestive system, protein and sugar in it, and then excrete excess sugar and water and sprinkle it on the branches and leaves of plants, which will be used by bees to brew nectar.

It can be divided into two categories according to physical condition.

Honey has two different physical states at normal temperature and pressure, namely liquid state and crystal state (whether honey is stored in honey or separated from the nest room). Under normal circumstances, the honey just separated is liquid, clear and transparent, and has good fluidity. When honey is left for a period of time or at low temperature, most of it will form solid crystals, so people usually divide it into liquid honey and crystalline honey.

Crystalline honey can be divided into large crystals, small crystals and greasy crystals due to different crystal sizes. Large crystals are crystals with a diameter of 0.5 microns. Particles with a diameter less than 0.5 micron are small crystals; Crystal particles are very small and look uniform, which are called greasy crystals or oily crystals.

According to the mode of production, it can be divided into two categories.

Honey can be divided into separation according to different production methods.

Honey and nest honey.

Separate honey

Separation of honey, or separation of heart honey or pressed honey, refers to the honey taken out of the hive, put in a honey shaker, shaken out by centrifugal force, filtered, or separated and filtered from honey by pressing the nest and spleen. This fresh honey is generally in a transparent liquid state, and some separated honey will crystallize after a period of time, for example, rape honey will crystallize soon after it is taken out. Some honey will crystallize at low temperature or after a period of time.

ceromel

Nest honey, also known as grid honey, is a kind of natural honey product that uses the biological characteristics of bees to brew honey blocks and nest honey in a standardized hive, which not only has the effect of separating honey, but also has the characteristics of honeycomb, and is regarded as the most perfect and top grade. People can produce single honey in different formats according to the flow law of nectar from nectar source plants and the habit of bees to cover the honey spleen. A nested frame can be divided into 4 blocks, 8 blocks and 12 blocks. Experiments show that as long as there is enough external honey source, no matter the size of the square, bees can make cards, fill honey and cover. The larger the area of a single honey block, the faster the sealing. Beehives sold in the market are made of transparent and non-toxic hard plastics with different sizes and shapes, or the covered honey brands are divided into honey blocks with a knife. First, a nest frame with a certain format is made, then a small nest base is embedded in the grid, and a honey collection colony is put in, so that bees can build a nest spleen in the grid, store honey, seal it into nest honey, and the nest honey has two sides and one side, and then brew it into qualified nest honey.

According to color, it can be divided into 7 categories.

Different kinds of nectar plants have great differences in the color of honey. Whether it is a single flower or a mixed honey seed, it has a certain color, and it is often a faint honey seed with good taste and smell. Therefore, the color of honey can be used not only as the basis for honey classification, but also as one of the indicators to measure the quality of honey. It is generally believed that the quality of light-colored honey is better than that of dark-colored honey. In the international market, honey is divided into special honey (single flower honey, such as linden honey) and mixed honey, and there are color differences between them. It is divided into seven grades: water white, extra white, white, extra light amber, light amber, amber and dark amber. The basis for distinguishing colors is Pfonte colorimeter, and the grades are as follows according to the readings of Pfonte colorimeter:

Water white 8 mm

Tebai 8 ~17mm

White17 ~ 34mm

Ultra-light amber 34 ~ 50mm

Light amber 50 ~ 85mm

Amber 85 ~114mm

Dark amber114 ~140mm

According to nectar plants, it can be divided into two types.

According to nectar source plants, it can be divided into single nectar and mixed nectar (hundred flowers nectar)

Single nectar

From different honey source plants, according to different honey source plants, it can be divided into various single honey sources with a certain flowering period as the main body, such as linden honey, litchi honey, longan honey, citrus honey, loquat honey, rape honey, locust honey, Chinese milk vetch honey, jujube honey, wild osmanthus honey, Vitex negundo, motherwort honey, wild chrysanthemum honey and so on.

Miscellaneous nectar (Baihua honey)

Honey obtained by multiple plants blooming at the same time, in which the advantage of single plant nectar is not obvious, is called mixed nectar or hundred flowers nectar. The advantage of classifying honey according to honey source plants is that the color, fragrance, taste and medical care efficacy of honey are relatively stable, which is a more scientific classification method.

Content chart

Table of Nutritional Components of Honey (per kloc-0/00g)

Component name content component name content component name content edible part 100 moisture (g) 22 energy (kcal) 32 1 energy (kj) 1343 protein (g) 0.4 fat (g) 1.9 carbohydrate (g) 75.6. 8+0 vitamin A (mg) 0 carotene (mg) 0 retinol (mg) 0 thiamine (mg) 0 riboflavin (mg) 0.05 nicotinic acid (mg) 0. 1 vitamin C (mg) 3 vitamin E (t) (mg) 0A-E0 (β-γ)-

Composition description

The chemical composition of honey varies greatly with different bee species, honey source and environment. Its main components are fructose and glucose, accounting for about 70% in total. It also contains a small amount of sucrose, maltose, dextrin, gum, nitrogen-containing compounds, organic acids, volatile oil, pigments, waxes, natural spices, plant fragments (especially pollen grains), yeast, enzymes and inorganic salts.

Honey generally contains only trace vitamins, including vitamin A, vitamin B 1, vitamin B2, vitamin B6, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin K, nicotinic acid, pantothenic acid, folic acid, biotin and choline. Nitrogen compounds include protein, peptone and amino acids. There are invertase, catalase, amylase, oxidase and reductase.

Honey contains glucose and fructose, accounting for about 65 ~ 80%; Sucrose is very little, not more than 8%; Moisture16 ~ 25%; The content of dextrin, non-sugar substances, minerals and organic acids is about 5%. In addition, it also contains a small amount of enzymes, aromatic substances and vitamins. Different varieties of honey plants have different honey components.

Fresh and mature honey is a viscous transparent or translucent colloidal liquid, and some honey can gradually condense into crystals when placed at a lower temperature. The specific gravity of honey is1.401~1.443.

The color of honey varies greatly from water white to deep amber, because different varieties of nectar plants have different flowers' special fragrance.

Honey is a nutritious food. Fructose and glucose in honey are easily absorbed by human body. 1 kg of mature honey has a calorific value of 3280 kcal.

Honey has certain curative effect on some chronic diseases. Taking honey regularly has a good auxiliary medical effect on heart disease, hypertension, lung disease, eye disease, liver disease, dysentery, constipation, anemia, nervous system diseases, gastric and duodenal ulcers, etc. External use can also treat burns, moisturize the skin and prevent frostbite.