Honey is a natural sweetener that is thick and sweet. You can buy many different varieties that can be natural, or artificial. Before you buy that jar of honey, you need to be sure to read the ingredients label to see if it is safe. Is Honey Gluten Free?
What Is Honey?
Honey, in its natural form, is made by bees. It is thick and sweet. Honey is classified by the floral source and graded by quality ratings A-C. It is considered gluten-free and dairy-free in its natural state.
Honey bees can pollinate different flowers, adding subtle flavors and nutrients to the honey. Honey can be gathered from natural hives or domesticated hives. Local beekeepers often sell their honey at farmers' markets, or you can find it at almost any grocery store.
Honey is available as raw honey, pasteurized, unfiltered honey, or it can be processed with added ingredients.
100% pure tends to be more expensive due to its purity, reducing the cost of manufacturing honey. Some manufacturers add sweeteners and other artificial ingredients to their honey. This is where the danger of gluten contamination can come from.
Check out all of the research on which baking ingredients are gluten free.
Answer: Is Honey Gluten Free?
If you are on a gluten free diet, you need to take care to ensure the honey you purchase is gluten free. Natural 100% honey is gluten free because it is a wholesome product made with only flower pollen and the bees' enzymes. Unfortunately, some honey is not gluten free.
You need to read the labels on honey to look for some red flags.
- Be sure that your 100% pure honey wasn't processed in a facility that processes gluten. Look for a dedicated gluten free facility, or buy honey from your local beekeepers.
- Look out for gluten dangers in honey production where added artificial flavors, added ingredients, and sweeteners could be added. You also need to take care to note if you are buying real, fake, or artificial honey.
Fake and Artificial Honey:
Unfortunately, due to the cost of natural honey, some manufacturers are making fake and artificial honey. These often have the potential for hidden gluten-containing ingredients. The bottom line is that you should avoid any fake or artificial honey if you have celiac disease, gluten intolerance, gluten allergy, or gluten sensitivity.
Artificial honey is produced with chemical processes to replicate the sweet liquid in both texture and flavor. It can be made with inverted sugars, sucrose, water, ash, starch, and other ingredients. Artificial honey has no real honey in it, and it is cheap to manufacture. It has a big risk of cross-contamination and gluten-containing foods.
Fake honey may have some real honey in it, but it was mixed with other ingredients like dextrose, added sugar, molasses, corn syrup, sugar, flour, etc. Mixing honey with these ingredients makes it much cheaper to produce than pure honey. It also has a lot of risk due to all of the extra ingredients.
Artificial honey is often made with corn syrup. Check out Is Corn Syrup Gluten Free?
In Summary:
You are free to use any honey you like, but if you are gluten-free, I suggest being sure the honey you buy is pure honey. Read the label to ensure it is not made in a facility that processes gluten.
Ways To Use Honey:
- The most common way to use honey is in tea. I am a huge fan of adding mint to my tea. If you love fresh mint flavor but don't have it on hand, you need to check out these 10 Easy Mint Substitutes.
- Bake with honey as I did in this Gluten Free Honeycake recipe.
- Use it in savory recipes like this Honey Garlic Salmon recipe.
- I love honey in this creamy Honey Ice Cream.
- Honey Cashews are delicious for snacking!
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