Nicholas Jordan and a hive mind of judges tasted 27 brands of honey and found that while the best were ‘perfumed as hell’, others were as basic as reality TV
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I’ve bought a lot of honey in my life. I purchased kilos of the stuff back when I used to make unmanageably large batches of bootleg muesli. But I don’t think I’ve ever purchased honey and thought about what I’m buying. I couldn’t even name the brands in my cupboard, let alone describe my thought process in choosing them.
I want to be more judicious, but how? All the ingredients are the same. There’s a huge variation in price, and I know from previous taste tests that price is a terrible predictor of deliciousness. So what should I look at? Colour? Branding? Organic certification? Specific botanicals? Where the honey comes from? It’s literally choosing a book by its cover.
7:36We tried 27 supermarket honeys to find Australia’s best | Taste Test, episode 1 – video View image in fullscreenWhen it comes to honey there’s a huge variation in price – and branding. Photograph: James Gourley/The GuardianI’m about as far as you can get from tech bro optimisation – I get a thrill from hitchhiking, eating unknown ingredients and being yelled at from passing cars. But this level of unpredictability and imprecision makes even me uncomfortable. The difference is, it doesn’t cost any money to be yelled at. Honey comes at a price, and I spent a lot of time acquiring those dollars, so I want to be informed when spending them.
Australian supermarket mustard taste test: the most intense is ‘an excellent torture device’Read moreI ran the taste test with column regulars alongside two tasters with more formal honey-judging experience: Barbara Sweeney and Rebecca Bernstone. We tried 27 honeys, all available in Australian supermarkets. We scored based on aroma, taste, viscosity and character (depth and distinctiveness). The scores below are based on taste and character.
View image in fullscreenThe honeys were scored based on aroma, taste, character … and viscosity. Photograph: James Gourley/The Guardian View image in fullscreen‘Think less about the scores … and more about the kind of honey you want.’ Photograph: James Gourley/The GuardianAs I guessed, there are no shockers – maybe some hard-to-explain flavours, but certainly nothing revolting. Good news for Nick the taste-tester; disappointing for Nick the writer; and great for Nick the supermarket customer. The cheapest, crappest honey out there, maybe one cut with sugar syrup, is still delicious, if lacking a little depth. But the same fact that makes every honey a defensible purchase also makes it difficult to recommend which one to purchase. Unlike other products (hash browns are a good example), where you can get close to a relatively objective hierarchy, honey is more of a find-the-one-for-you situation: think less about the scores and awards, and more about the kind of honey you want.
If you get your movie recommendations from Cannes, look at the organic selection or any honey with a claim about botanicals. That’s where you’ll find products that can provoke a thought; unlike almost every other taste test, organic honeys outscored their non-organic competitors. If you want an unfussy, sweet experience to mindlessly soothe you like ASMR, look at the homebrands and Beechworth and Capilano’s regular range. For anything more specific, you’ll have to read on.
Honeys with a lot of character
View image in fullscreenMacro Organic Australian Pure Honey, 400g, $7 ($1.75 per 100g), available at Woolworths
Imagine you’re going in and out of house inspections. All of them are styled by real estate agents. They’re clean and absent of colour or character, a scene desperate to say “this is for you”, and by extension everyone. Then, after that experience, imagine how you’d feel walking into a Yayoi Kusama exhibition. That’s how I felt after trying this, the 24th honey of the day.
“Finally,” one reviewer wrote, “true beeroir. A complex and enjoyable window into Mother Nature’s house”. Another wrote only “ORANGE PEEL” and “HEAPS GOING ON”. Other reviewers talked about floral elements, orange blossom and earl grey. I remember one of us saying, loudly: “Now this is honey.”
View image in fullscreenGolden Nectar Organic Real Leatherwood Honey, 500g, $14 ($2.80 per 100g), available at select grocers
A badly kept secret of the supermarket world is that some producers sell the same (or an extremely similar product) to multiple companies. The same honey could be sold with two radically different brands and names in the same supermarket. Many reviewers thought this and Macro might be the same product in two different packages. They were wrong: they’re just coincidentally both very floral, perfumed honeys.
The wiser of us who picked up some differences described Golden Nectar’s buttery element compared with Macro’s slightly bitter appeal. “Perfumed as hell,” wrote one reviewer, later saying it was like eating the smell of potpourri.
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Good value honeys
View image in fullscreenCloverdale Pure Honey, 375g, $3.30 (88c per 100g), available at Woolworths
When I was deciding how to categorise these honeys, this one really confused things. It was the cheapest honey we tried, one of only two featuring non-Australian honeys (Chandler’s was the other) and it belonged in the aforementioned category of uncomplicated sweet experiences. But it makes the most sense here as it is, by some margin, the cheapest product on the market, but doesn’t necessarily taste like it. I thought it tasted like it’d been cooked – like treacle but without any bitterness (potentially a by-product of a pasteurisation process). Other reviewers had similar thoughts, describing it as caramel, burnt and youthful. This honey won’t evoke wildflowers blooming in pristine ecologies, but that doesn’t mean it’s not delicious.
View image in fullscreenArchibald’s Pure Australian Honey, 680g, $9.90 ($1.46 per 100g), available at Woolworths
It turned out the final stretch of samples, from 24th to the last, was an accidentally excellent series of honeys – so much so that I think I heard the line “now this is a honey” four times in a row. This was number 25. While the Macro and Golden Nectar were like eating spring blossoms in an English garden, this was more like a citrus orchard. It’s slightly sour, sort of caramel-y in sweetness and has a little astringency (the dry mouth feeling that comes from underripe fruit). It’s powerful and more-ish, leading to one reviewer asking me whether he could have a crumpet.
Unusual honeys
View image in fullscreenAirborne Pure Honey, 500g, $9 ($1.80 per 100g), available at Woolworths
Across 40-plus taste tests, I’ve rarely experienced such wild and diverging discussion. I heard this described as olives, peppermint lollipops, dog smell, leather factory and liquorice. No one really listened or agreed with each other until someone suggested this tasted like the smell of dead ants which, I was excited to read, could make some chemical sense, considering honey can contain traces of formic acid, which some Australian ants use as a defence mechanism. I would guess both that description and the sensory experience that inspired it will divide people, as it did these reviewers.
View image in fullscreenCommunity Co 100% Pure Australian Honey, 375g, $5.50 ($1.47 per 100g), available at IGA
Unlike the last defence of a dying ant, medicinal flavours were more what I expected from a honey taste test. What surprised me was the degree – almost like the bees have had their proboscises treated with Betadine. Others also thought it was funky, in good and bad ways – sour to smell and a bit olive-y to taste, like eating next to the bin outside Woolworths, one reviewer said. Like Cloverdale and Chandler’s, it’s very thin. One reviewer wrote “it’s interesting, but I’m not sure that I liked it,” which is probably the best summary.
A particularly thick honey
View image in fullscreenGumeracha Pure Honey, 500g, $12.60 ($2.52 per 100g), available at select grocers
Classic honey, the reviewers said. Since the milk taste test, it’s a description we’ve used jokingly and desperately for any product that just doesn’t inspire any other commentary. Besides the severe viscosity, there’s not too much going on. With little else to say, I’m going to use this extra space to educate. You will find very thick honeys on the supermarket shelves; many will be crystallised – a natural process where sugar crystals separate from the honey liquid. This says nothing about the quality or “naturalness” of the honey. If you like viscosity and extra texture, eat it like that. If not, bring it back to a completely liquid state by placing the container in warm but not hot water, as higher temperatures can change the honey’s flavour.
The most basic honey
View image in fullscreenByron Bay Raw & Unfiltered Honey, 500g, $9.60 ($1.92 per 100g), available at major supermarkets
This is modern reality TV in a honey. It’s so uncomplicated and simple in its appeal, it ends up being a little sickening – so much so, you begin to question how it’s made and what’s happening behind the scenes. After I ate this, I wondered if I tasted this in a line-up of slightly caramelised syrups, whether it would stand out. I think it says a lot how few notes this product inspired. Two people said it was too sweet, two others simply wrote they didn’t have much to say. What I want to know is what the owners of this brand – the same company also owns Capilano – are hoping to achieve with the name. Do they think evoking the spiritual capital of the Airbnb experience and the Australian anti-vaxxer movement will endow their honey with a sense of purity and healthiness? Well, I’d like you to know this is the fifth Byron Bay branded product I’ve tried in a taste test, and none of them scored above a 5/10.
Chart showing the results of the honey taste-testing.