Argentine Beekeepers' Magazine

(Espacio Apícola, July 5th, 2022) London Honey Awards ceremony will be held next Saturday, July 9th. This contest is oganized by George Kouvelis who also organizes a similar contest assessing olive oil quality every year.

George invites all interested parties to present their honeys in this contest every year whose purpose is to inform honey growers, honey producers, beekeepers, processors and retailers, who distribute their legally standardized products, to preserve and improve the quality of its brand product by promoting high quality honey, in all aspects of the spectrum of its use and consumption -as explained on its website https://www.londonhoneyawards.com/.

The ceremony will take place at the ILEC Conference Center of the London Earls Court Hotel, a three-star hotel of the IBIS chain.

The awards are divided into two main groups, quality and packaging. In the packaging, the labels and also the general appearance are valued separately. According to the score obtained, the prizes can be Platinum, Gold, Silver and Bronze.

Among the Platinum honeys, there are many samples of Sidr honey, a very common wild plant in the Middle East of the genus Zizyphus, the same one to which the Argentinian Mistol belonged with a very similar fruit. Zizyphus mistol has been reclassified as Sarcomphalus mistol although its leaves and fruits are very similar to Sidr, including the size of the plant. The Sidr, for its part, Zizyphus spina-christi, bears this name because tradition says that the crown of thorns of Jesus Christ would have been made with its branches, which gives added value to the particular flavor and aroma of this honey.

Then, Platinum awards were also given to berries honey (from blue berry and lingon (cranberry) varieties), a Kuwaiti acacia, cremated rapeseed honey from Hungary, as well as white multifloral honeys from Canada, the United Kingdom and United States, multiflorals from the Slovak forest, also the typical acacia honey (Robinia pseudoacacia) also from Slovakia, among many other varieties from different countries.

In the Gold category, the dispersion is greater, there are Manuka honeys from New Zealand, Eucalypthus sideroxylon honey from South Africa, honeys from acacia, tamarix, pumpkin, linden, oak, chestnut, lavender, apple, thyme, cherry, pine, coriander, jujube and nummularia which are two other species of Zizyphus, and others. So far the only Spanish-speaking country with award-winning honey is Spain, there are also many European countries such as Hungary, Greece, France, Germany and others, from Spain to the west to Türkye also Georgia to the east.

Among the ones that most caught our attention we found honeys from Tahl and other unknown species, but also, among those awarded Silver, we found a multiflora honey from Rwuanda (Africa), one from Hong Kong (China) with native flora and cooffee honey from Vietnam.

It is worth stopping to visit the website https://www.londonhoneyawards.com/