The Power of Manuka Honey 

Honey has played an important role in both health and culinary activities for centuries, the medicinal importance of honey has been documented in the world's oldest medical literature, - including Egyptian records from over 7000 years ago. More recently, it's been discovered that mānuka honey has a magic ingredient called methylglyoxal or MGO propelling it to super-honey status making it stand out from other honeys. 

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What’s so special about high MGO manuka honey?​

Many people use high-grade manuka honey medicinally or as a daily tonic.

There are dozens of scientific studies that have found manuka honey to be particularly effective for certain conditions.

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New Zealand law prevents us from making therapeutic claims about manuka honey as we sell the honey as a food product not a medicine, but a quick search for manuka honey on PubMed is a great place to start to learn about its unique properties.

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How do we collect and prepare our manuka honey for market?

Mānuka is the indigenous māori name for the Leptospermum scoparium tree. In the Far North, the mānuka tree has its main flowering months in October and November.  Our bees collect the mānuka nectar to make honey during the flowering months.

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There’s a special ingredient that starts its life in the nectar of the manuka flower at this time called dihydroxyacetone (DHA). Once the nectar has been collected by our bees and turned in to honey the magic begins.  After the honey has been harvested the DHA levels slowly go down and MGO levels start to rise.

 

After a period about a year the honey has matured and there are high levels of MGO. That's when we grade the honey into 130+, 263+, 500+ or 800+.  This number represents the minimum amount in milligrams per kilogram of the MGO. So, in general, the higher the MGO grade the more our bees have foraged on mānuka flowers alone.