Honey

The taste of honey is determined by the flowers from which the bees have derived their nectar. In order to encourage the bees to collect from one type of flower, their keeper moves the hives to different locations at different times during the summer. This is called migratory bee-keeping and allows the bees to range in an area during the time when a particular blossom holds sway, a practice that carries inevitable costs and accordingly makes single-blossom (monofloral) honeys more expensive.

These single-source honeys, such as thyme, lavender, rosemary and lime, are heavily perfumed, making them ill-suited to most cooking, though they work well enough in ice-cream. The EU regulates honey production and polices claims of organic provenance. Since a bee ranges over several miles, proximity to inorganic fertilization of flowering plants and trees or industrial pollution has to be taken into account when labelling pots and jars.