> What can I safely do with this honey? Can humans consume it without > worry? Unprocessed honey under 17% moisture is stable when extracted and not likely to ferment. Commercially packaged and pasteurized honey is normally blended to 18.6%. Pasteurization kills the yeasts which otherwise can cause the honey to spoil. Spoiled honey is not necessarily unpalatable. In fact honey normally becomes mead when it ferments, and mead has been a popular and legendary drink for all of recorded history. In a wet year, high moisture can be a problem, even in a big outfit, but usually the buyers will take 'wet' honey at a discount as they can use it to blend the drier honey down to 18.6%. The discount should reflect only lower sugars content, but some buyers are predatory and try to buy cheap if the seller is not savvy. 'Wet' honey needs to be handled with added care as to storage time and temperature, and blended before it begins to 'turn'. Small amounts of 'wet' honey can be stored in a home freezer, where it will keep indefinitely -- and stay liquid, too. Honey does not actually freeze at home deep freezer temperatures, so it can even be 'frozen' safely in glass jars. You can also pasteurize it yourself using the same time/temperature tables as used for pasteurizing milk. With honey, though, it is advisable to stay down around 130 degrees and be careful not to create hot spots on the vessel with direct flame.. *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html