Perfect Health for Kids: Ten Ayurvedic Health Secrets Every Parent Must Know includes a description of a study which compared beekeepers use of raw honey and pasteurized honey. Beekeepers routinely“spray bee hives with a solution of raw honey and water on beehives to keep the bees calm. A study was done comparing the use of raw versus pasteurized honey. When a solution of pasteurized honey was used, all of the bees exposed died within 20 minutes.”
This study shows how pasteurization can profoundly alter a food, transforming it from a beneficial, nutritious, calming food to a poison.
A few weeks ago I had a post called “All About Honey” which included a recipe for coconut meringue recipe using honey. I would actually use agave nectar in the recipe and save the honey for uncooked food–like honey mustard dipping sauce or to sweeten lemonade because cooked honey does not have the enzymes and health benefits of raw honey.
Although the honey got all of us off sugar, it didn’t agree with everyone in our family and my son’s stomach got very bloated. Perhaps it was the cooked honey. But, others who have done the Specific Carbohydrate Diet have reported that honey did not agree with them and made them bloated. This would be one example where theory is one thing, but reality is different and honey, although it is a monosaccharide, might not agree with everyone.