So here's the debate. Honey or agave? If you're anything like me, you consume your body weight in tea every day. I used to use honey to sweeten my brew. But then I learned it wasn't "vegan".
Does it matter? Bees aren't hurt while making the honey, right? They'd do it anyways? Besides, honey has so many soothing qualities.
Well, I'm going to lay it all out there for you. Because after all, this is a personal choice, and just because you decide you can't live without honey doesn't make you a murderer or any less conscious than honey-free vegans (in my point of view). So let's take a look at the two:
Honey
Wikipedia says honey "is a sweet food made by bees using
nectar from
flowers. The variety produced by
honey bees (the
genus Apis) is the one most commonly referred to and is the type of honey collected by
beekeepers and consumed by humans. Honey produced by other
bees and insects has distinctly different properties."
Basically, honey bees collect nectar from flowers and store it in their honey stomachs, where they ingest and regurgitate it several times until it is partially digested. The bees work together until the honey is at the consistency desired, and then they store it in the honeycomb.
Humans have been hunting honey for thousands of years. It was used in Ancient Egypt as a natural sweetener and throughout the Middle East for embalming the dead. In Hindu, honey is one of the five elixirs of immortality, and the book of Exodus describes the Promised Land as flowing with "milk and honey".
Now for the science and nutrition of it all, via Wikipedia:
Honey is a mixture of sugars and other compounds. With respect to carbohydrates, honey is mainly
fructose (about 38.5%) and
glucose (about 31.0%),
making it similar to the synthetically produced
inverted sugar syrup, which is approximately 48% fructose, 47% glucose, and 5%
sucrose. Honey's remaining carbohydrates include
maltose, sucrose, and other
complex carbohydrates.
As with all nutritive sweeteners, honey is mostly sugars and contains only trace amounts of
vitamins or
minerals.
Honey also contains tiny amounts of several compounds thought to function as
antioxidants, including
chrysin,
pinobanksin,
vitamin C,
catalase, and
pinocembrin.
[23][24][vague] The specific composition of any batch of honey depends on the flowers available to the bees that produced the honey.
Typical honey analysis.
...whatever the heck that means!
Honey has been a part of my life since I can remember. As a Southern girl, I put it on biscuits, pancakes, cornbread. Just about anything that may be a breakfast food. I always thought I was being nutritionally conscious by using honey instead of sugar in my tea, and with certain baking recipes. I love the taste, the texture and the color of honey. And I swear by honey and hot water as a hangover ease.
I went to Vegan.com to see if it is or isn't vegan. This is what they said:
Is honey vegan? Again, it depends on one's definition of vegan. Insects are animals, and so insect products, such as honey and silk, are not traditionally considered vegan. Many vegans, however, are not opposed to using insect products, because they do not believe insects are conscious of pain. Moreover, even if insects were conscious of pain, it's not clear that the production of honey involves any more pain for insects than the production of most vegetables, since the harvesting and transportation of all vegetables involves many 'collateral' insect deaths.
The question remains a matter of scientific debate and personal choice. However, when cooking or labeling food for vegans —particularly vegans you don't know— it's best to be on the safe side and not include honey.
So I've started pondering it. I love honey, but I hate to think that bees are being forced to do something. That the smallest of creatures may be injured or killed in producing something for me. But like I said earlier, wouldn't they do it in nature, anyways? Isn't it good that we are actually consuming something they made, because it would otherwise, more than likely, go to waste?
Agave Nectar
This sweet syrup comes from a plant that looks to me like the aloe plant. It is green and spiky, and is found mostly in Mexico, the Southern United States, and in central and tropical South America.
Again, the science of it all, as found in Wikipedia:
Agave nectar consists primarily of
fructose and
glucose. One source gives 92% fructose and 8% glucose; another gives 56% fructose and 20% glucose. These differences presumably reflect variation from one vendor of agave nectar to another.
Agave nectar's
glycemic index and
glycemic load are comparable to fructose,
which in turn has a much lower glycemic index and glycemic load than table sugar (
sucrose).
However, consumption of large amounts of fructose can be
deleterious and can trigger
fructose malabsorption,
metabolic syndrome,
hypertriglyceridemia, decreased
glucose tolerance,
hyperinsulinemia, and accelerated
uric acid formation.
Kudos if you read and/or understand all of that.
Because agave nectar is 1.4 to 1.6 times sweeter than sugar, it is often used as a sugar or honey replacement in recipes. It is most commonly known as a honey replacement for vegans, and an acceptable sweetener for raw foodists, as it is produced below 118 °F (48 °C) to protect the natural enzymes.
Nothing is injured in obtaining agave nectar, unless of course, you include the agave plant. But no animals are hurt or killed. The taste is neutral, just like sugar with a honey-like consistency.
SO, honey or agave? Which is it for you? Personally, I've switched to agave for now. I adore the taste of honey, and miss it, quite frankly. But I'm trying to do this vegan thing right. One day I may decide that honey isn't a big deal, and is merely bee vomit. I can predict this will be after a night of drinking, when I'm craving relief in the form of honey and hot water. Or when I travel back to the South and am presented with delicious vegan biscuits (though South and vegan don't really go together). I will have to put honey on those suckers.
And after seeing Bee Movie, I'm partial to the plight of the honey bee. Yes, this is a joke, but it's amazing how those cartoons can make you think twice (enter, Fern Gully).
But when it comes down to it, it's up to you. Either choice is significantly better for you than artificial sweeteners or sugar. So enjoy sweetening your tea with whichever natural delight you choose!
