# Honey, Minus Sugar
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 19, 2009, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831 "2009-12-19T04:01:47Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/1 "2009-12-19T04:01:47Z")
Looking at the Wikipedia page for [honey](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honey), it seems to be almost entirely just various forms of sugar and water. Ash and Other are only 0.3% of the total contents. Despite this, honey has a distinctive flavor as compared to sugar. Is this distinctive flavor the particular mix of sugars, or is it that 0.3%? If it’s the latter, is there any way to know what that tastes like, minus all the sugar?
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/2 "2009-12-19T04:22:21Z")
Honey is not sucrose but mostly invert sugar, a combination of fructose and glucose plus a sprinkling of other sugars. There’s no good reason it should taste like sucrose in the first place.
That said, the flowers the bees feed on are said to affect the flavor of the honey, and those chemicals have to be part of the 0.3% but I doubt if you would find those palatable on their own.
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### Author:  [@Teacake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teacake)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/3 "2009-12-19T11:58:26Z")
You can find out what nectar tastes like by sipping it straight from the flower. When I was a kid (in Europe/the UK) there were plants we called dead nettles, which had small horn-shaped flowers you could pull off, suck the end and get a little drop of nectar. We used to eat hundreds of them.
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### Author:  [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/4 "2009-12-19T12:27:22Z")
Surely the bee spit, digestive enzymes and honeysack exposure prior to regurgitation and mastication, along with other chemicals in the hive air are infused into the honey and add flavor as well, even if the quantitative percentages are small.
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### Author:  [@SmartAlecCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAlecCat)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/5 "2009-12-19T12:52:35Z")
> [@Teacake](#):
>
> You can find out what nectar tastes like by sipping it straight from the flower. When I was a kid (in Europe/the UK) there were plants we called dead nettles, which had small horn-shaped flowers you could pull off, suck the end and get a little drop of nectar. We used to eat hundreds of them.
We used to do that with [Honeysuckle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeysuckle).
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### Author:  [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/6 "2009-12-19T14:12:43Z")
Mmm … there was a honeysuckle vine growing near my bus stop when I was growing up. Pulling off and sucking on the flowers one by one was a nice way to kill the time while waiting for the school bus to arrive.
For the OP, I’ve seen “honey solids” or something along those lines in certain ingredients lists. That would probably have a concentrated flavor.
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### Author:  [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/7 "2009-12-19T15:29:55Z")
Honey flavour or [aroma](http://www.stringer-flavour.com/flavour_detail.asp?FlavourID=127) is used as an additive to make stuff, from sugar syrup to desserts to soap, smell or taste like honey.
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### Author:  [@picker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picker)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/8 "2009-12-19T16:18:22Z")
It’s the bee poop you’re tasting.
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### Author:  [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/9 "2009-12-19T16:29:20Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#):
>
> That said, the flowers the bees feed on are said to affect the flavor of the honey
“Are said to”? That sounds rather unwarrantedly skeptical. In specialty honey shops it’s possible to buy honey from various flowers, and it’s easy to tell the difference between them by taste alone.
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/10 "2009-12-19T17:06:37Z")
> [@psychonaut](#):
>
> “Are said to”? That sounds rather unwarrantedly skeptical. In specialty honey shops it’s possible to buy honey from various flowers, and it’s easy to tell the difference between them by taste alone.
I don’t know this from personal experience so I gave a hedge.
I know, I know. Anything that you may have read about some time in the past is supposed to be presented as the absolute final truth and be defended for thirty pages. I have besmirched the honor of the Dope. Give me a pistol with one bullet and discreetly shut the door.
I’ll duck out the other door and go home, so don’t expect anything grisly when you get tired of waiting. 😛
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/11 "2009-12-19T17:09:56Z")
> [@psychonaut](#):
>
> “Are said to”? That sounds rather unwarrantedly skeptical. In specialty honey shops it’s possible to buy honey from various flowers, and it’s easy to tell the difference between them by taste alone.
You often get a double-blind test when you enter honey shops? 😉
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### Author:  [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2009, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/honey-minus-sugar/521831/12 "2009-12-19T17:11:16Z")
> [@picker](#):
>
> It’s the bee poop you’re tasting.
Bee barf, surely?