Purple Honey Is Real, and It Only Comes From One Place on Earth
No, it doesn’t come from purple bees.
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When you think of honey, you’re probably picturing a liquid with a warm, amber color. In fact, the word is practically synonymous with the color. Well, nature sometimes throws its curveballs, and one of them is the appearance of an ultra-rare purple honey. It has a natural violet hue and tastes sweeter than regular honey with a tinge of berry flavor.
Beekeepers have only been able to collect purple honey in the sandhills of North Carolina. If you’re lucky, you may be able to find it at a farmers’ market in the region or directly from a beekeeper during the summer. However, since it’s so uncommon, if you come across a jar, you should expect to pay a premium for it.
It's impossible to predict exactly when the special honey will appear, though beekeepers notice it pops up in the warmer months. If two hives are next to each other, one can make purple honey while its neighbor doesn’t. The honey can also emerge in a hive that has never produced it before.
The reason behind this randomness is still a mystery, but scholars have a pretty good idea of what makes the hue possible. While Zach and Lilly claim in The Secret Life of Bees that bees snack on berries to make purple honey, the late North Carolina State University professor John Ambrose had a different theory. He studied local bees in the 1970s to find the source of the purple tint and the answer has nothing to do with fruit.
As it turns out, flowers in the Coastal Plain have unusually high levels of aluminum in their nectar. When aluminum reacts with the digestive fluid in bees’ stomachs, it turns a blueish purple. He specifically traced the color back to sourwood trees growing in the aluminum-rich soil.
So there you have it: Purple honey is as real as it is surreal. Next time you’re in North Carolina, keep an eye out for it!
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