The Beekeeper's Keep Will Keep

When I was a kid, my grandfather supplemented his retirement funds by being a beekeeper. The technical term for a beekeeper is an apiarist, but beekeeper's much more to the point. So needless to say, honey's been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. When I'd get burns as a child, the burn would be covered in honey. My grandmother used to sing to me, "Honey in the morning, honey in the evening, honey at suppertime. Won't you be my honey, and love me all the time?" I'd have peanut butter and honey on my toast. My life was infused with honey. Honey has a place in my heart now, and it will forever.

So I guess it's a good thing that honey will never go bad.

Assuming the honey
was good to start with, that is.

What deliberately
fermented honey
looks like.

Alright, it's not entirely true that honey won't go bad, but it can be. Basically, honey is fairly acidic (somewhere between orange juice and a tomato), very high in sugar, and it traps moisture easily. Those three factors mean that honey, if it's in a container that doesn't allow moisture to enter it, doesn't support any bacterial growth since either the acidity, the high sugar, or the lack of water will keep any bacteria from surviving in it. If it's not in a moisture-proof container, the honey will eventually absorb enough moisture for it to dilute enough for things to grow in it. Usually this will result in the honey fermenting (ya alcohol!), sometimes it will end up being much more dangerous, but properly sealed? It will keep pretty much forever.

It is said (although I cannot find a copy of the original source, although I know it's attributed to archaeologist Theodore M. Davis and the Sept. 1913 issues of National Geographic) that some honey found in Egyptian tombs is still edible, after roughly 3,300 years. I personally still have a container of perfectly edible honey from my grandfather's hives, and he's been dead for over a decade, and he retired from beekeeping years before that.

That's not saying that all honey is safe.  I mean,  just because nothing dangerous will grow in it, that doesn't mean that there's nothing dangerous in it to start with.

First off, there's a good chance that there are spores from the bacteria that cause botulism in honey, and while there's not enough of them to be dangerous to an adult (we tend to digest the spores) they can be dangerous for very small children, so honey shouldn't be given to kids under a year old.

Secondly, bees sometimes get their pollen and nectar from plants which are toxic to people but that have no effect on the bees.  Honey made from nectar from the common rhododendron, for instance, can cause both delirium and vomiting.  A whole host of plants can give rise to toxic honey, with symptoms varying from excessive perspiration and dizziness to paralysis and death, with a whole host of possibilities in between.  In fact, it's said that honey made from hives where opium poppies are common is narcotic.

Commercially farmed honey is rarely toxic because the honey comes from enough sources that any toxic components are only present in trace amounts, and in general it's a problem more associated with wild hives.

Properly stored honey: As good as the day it was put away.

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Sources:
Image of the Honey movie poster taken from Online-movies-free.com - I in no way use or endorse this site, it's just where I took the image from
Mead bottle image taken from Bunratty Winery
Honey-Health.com
Canadian Honey Council
National Honey Board of America
Wikipedia articles on honey and bees and toxic chemicals