Every Lal Anatolia batch is sent to an independent laboratory before it is offered, and the report belongs to the jar. Most people have never seen one. Here is what it says.
Adulteration
The most common fraud in honey is dilution with sugar syrup, from cane or corn, which the laboratory detects by isotope ratio and marker analysis. A clean result means no foreign sugar was found. Our colonies are never fed, so this is the test we worry about least and insist on most.
HMF
Hydroxymethylfurfural is a compound that forms when honey is heated or stored too long and too warm. Fresh raw honey has very little. A high figure tells you the honey has been pasteurised, or is old. Because we never warm our honey, the HMF on our reports stays low, and we would rather you checked than took our word for it.
Diastase
An enzyme the bees add while making honey. Heat destroys it. A healthy diastase number is the positive proof that the honey is still alive, in the sense that matters.
Moisture
Honey with too much water ferments. The bees cap the comb only when the honey is dry enough, and we harvest only capped comb, so moisture on our reports sits where nature put it.
Residues
Antibiotics and pesticides are screened for. Wild colonies on a mountain no one farms give a straightforward answer here.
Pollen
Melissopalynology, the counting of pollen grains under a microscope, tells you what the bees visited. It is how we can say that a jar is cave honey from oak country, or meadow honey dominated by thyme, and have it be more than a story.
If you have a jar, write to us with the batch number. We will send the report.