Honey: nutrition and how to use it

Fun facts

• In its whole life, one worker bee makes only about a twelfth of a teaspoon of honey. Every spoonful you pour is the work of a crowd.
• 100g of honey has 304 kcal and 82.1g of sugar. It is still sugar, just glucose and fructose sitting apart instead of joined together like table sugar.
• Honey is heavier than sugar. A tablespoon weighs about 21g, which is around 64 kcal and 17g of sugar, more than a tablespoon of white sugar.
• The minerals are real but tiny: 100g of honey holds just 52mg of potassium, about what you get from a small bite of banana.

Choosing and storing

Real honey can crystallize into white grains when it gets cold. That is natural, not a sign of fake honey. To make it runny again, stand the jar in warm water. Keep the lid tight and the jar somewhere cool and dry; no fridge needed. Honey holds very little water, so it keeps for a long time, as long as no wet spoon goes in.

Cooking it well

Honey is intensely sweet and aromatic, so a little goes a long way in lemonade, a grilled meat marinade or a drizzle over yogurt. Baked goods with honey brown faster, so keep an eye on the oven. We compared honey and sugar in detail here: Is honey better than sugar?. At kOBE, most dishes are sweetened with kOBE Signature Monk Fruit Blend, which swaps for sugar 1:1; a few use honey and carry the Nectar label.

Frequently asked questions