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Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by rrauenza on Sunday March 08, 2020 @01:06PM (#22519131)
And your olive oil might not be olive oil.

Our daughter is allergic to sunflower oil which is commonly used to adulterate the olive oil. Chips supposedly made with olive oil will sometimes give her a rash.

For bottled olive oil we try to buy local California olive oil...,

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by amlozano on Sunday March 08, 2020 @04:02PM (#22520211)
I used to trust the California Olive Ranch brand for olive oil, but lately noticed they started labeling their some of their bottles as imported and accidentally bought some. It tastes fine, but if I recall correctly the problems with olive oil usually come from imports where laws and regulation rules change from country to country.

Luckily I live close to a real olive mill, but there really is no way to know. Plus you have people arguing the vast majority of olive oil sold in the USA is "authentic" for some measure of authentic, which is really hard to discern: https://www.aboutoliveoil.org/the-facts-about-uc-davis-olive...

This feels like another one of those areas where as a consumer following the research and knowing what products are good to buy is almost a full time job.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by colanderman on Sunday March 08, 2020 @11:18PM (#22522699)
FWIW, they were probably forced to import to meet demand due to the poor California olive crop last year.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by hoopleheaded on Monday March 09, 2020 @05:11PM (#22529848)
After I noticed the change I went to the website to see what it was about and this is exactly what happened.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by cyphar on Sunday March 08, 2020 @08:17PM (#22521727)
If you want a quick way to test if your olive oil is actually extra virgin olive oil, get a green laser. When it passes through sufficiently pure olive oil the laser will change colour and become red, and then become green again when it passes out of the oil.

Obviously make sure you practice responsible laser safety, even for a cheap low-wattage laser.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by LeifCarrotson on Sunday March 08, 2020 @09:02PM (#22521975)
Fascinating! I was skeptical at first how the monochromatic light would "turn red", but on investigation olive oil is flourescent!

https://www.physicscentral.com/experiment/physicsathome/fluo...

I was looking around with a 532nm green laser pointer the other day, and found that it was almost totally attenuated when aimed at the red (cheap/fake) nectar in my hummingbird feeder. Further experimentation revealed that orange Gatorade was similarly super-absorbent, while beer was pretty transparent to the green light.

Just bought some Tonda Iblea DOP-certified oil and will be interested to try this! It's subjectively delicious, curious if it's objectively flourescent (and if my everyday supermarket olive oil is not).

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by jedberg on Sunday March 08, 2020 @01:32PM (#22519264)
From what I read before Costco does independent testing and their olive oil is unadulterated.

Might be something to look into if you have Costco nearby.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by pmoriarty on Sunday March 08, 2020 @03:58PM (#22520180)
"Costco does independent testing and their olive oil is unadulterated"

One of the interesting things I learned from the honey article was that fraudsters have figured out how to work their way around tests, at least for honey. I wouldn't be surprised if they could do the same for olive oil and other food products. It seems like a cat and mouse game.

Something not mentioned in the article is that testing labs themselves need to be tested, certified, and audited. There have been some scandals in forensic labs where techs have repeatedly falsified test results for decades. This is probably especially a problem when organized crime is involved.

If you are at all interested in food safety, I highly recommend "The Poison Squad", about the foundation of the FDA.[1][2]

[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euBoKIm1v6Q

[2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0rKnxm3X7M

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by casefields on Monday March 09, 2020 @05:33AM (#22524114)
PBS just aired an American Experience episode based on the book: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/poison-squa...
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by zamadatix on Sunday March 08, 2020 @05:07PM (#22520622)
If they remove enough to detect it was adulterated then would it trigger the allergic reaction though?
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by pmoriarty on Sunday March 08, 2020 @05:23PM (#22520712)
Removal isn't the only thing that happens. Sometimes they add in stuff like pollen.

Also, just because they fool the particular testing tools that labs use doesn't mean you as a consumer won't have an adverse reaction to whatever it was they put in to the honey.

The problem with adulteration isn't exclusively limited to harmful health effects either. Even if your health would not be adversely affected by the adulterants, you might still want to be certain you're getting is genuine.

Let's say you bought corn syrup while under the impression that it was honey. It might not harm your health any more than any other corn syrup would, but you've still been defrauded, and what you got might not have the same health benefits that honey has (assuming honey has such benefits).

Your purchasing decisions could have an ecological impact too. Effectively subsidizing the growing of corn by mistakenly buying corn syrup will have different ecological consequences than subsidizing the establishment of more bee colonies by buying genuine honey.

That's not to mention the ethical issues of being conned in to giving money to fraudsters versus giving it to honest business people.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by jbay808 on Sunday March 08, 2020 @08:41PM (#22521866)
Not to mention that if you actually would have been satisfied with corn syrup, you could presumably have gotten it at a better price by buying a bottle of corn syrup than by paying for a bottle labeled "honey" containing corn syrup.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by raducu on Sunday March 08, 2020 @04:02PM (#22520206)
The romans had an intricate system that prevented oil fraud, they could track and amphora back to the farm it originated in, and every step along the way.

We should be able to do the same with modern technology and severely penalize individuals who commit fraud.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by TeMPOraL on Monday March 09, 2020 @03:29AM (#22523605)
We have even better systems in place than the Romans did. They're just not used unless there's a health emergency (e.g. E. coli in the food).
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by tomatotomato37 on Sunday March 08, 2020 @01:25PM (#22519224)
It's not just might, I think something crazy like 80% of olive oil is adulterated. For whatever reason the olive oil industry has become the target of choice for Mediterranean crime syndicates.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by r6754dw on Sunday March 08, 2020 @01:29PM (#22519249)
Try buying Greek if you can find that. At least the Greek brands of extra virgin olive oil I've bought in Northern Europe look and taste just like the locally product I've enjoyed in Crete. Italian and non-EU brands on the other hand taste totally different - and I don't think it's because of geography.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by LargoLasskhyfv on Sunday March 08, 2020 @10:57PM (#22522568)
The thing with these suggestions is, they are all anecdotical from a single point in time and (market) space. I remember having read here somewhere, some time ago that maroccan or tunesian olive oil would be very good also, presumably because it isn't under the pressure of massive demand, so less incentive to fraud around it. Since decades this is a topic in consumer testing magazines and public television, and i can't remember anytime they didn't find at least one third fradulent. There are documentations out there, where they travel to Italy, speak with the local farmers, dealers, police and local government to get to root of this problem, and all involved parties (at least on the record) see it as a large problem too. Yet it is persistent.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by tasogare on Sunday March 08, 2020 @07:21PM (#22521392)
I'm friend with a Tunisian in the country we both live. One day he was really happy, because a fellow countryman brought him a jar of olive oil. I didn't understand, why the hassle of travelling half the world with a product available in any supermarket? He explain, then let me taste it. After that I understood... it's was incredibly tasty.

With the industrialization of food we (as a society) forgot the real taste of raw aliments and artisanal intermediate products.

Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by kcolford on Sunday March 08, 2020 @07:54PM (#22521603)
I read somewhere that the distinction of Kalamata olive oil is reserved only for oil that comes from Kalamata, Greece. It's high end, but honestly the flavour is absolutely worth it. Furthermore, higher end products are usually less likely to be tampered with in a race to the bottom.
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by nitrogen on Monday March 09, 2020 @01:47AM (#22523252)
Is there a risk of counterfeits though as you get into the higher end?
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by pacomerh on Sunday March 08, 2020 @05:22PM (#22520705)
Right, doesn't it need to say "extra virgin olive oil" to actually be pure?. Otherwise it could be a blend
Re:Fancy honey might not actually be honey by kcolford on Sunday March 08, 2020 @07:56PM (#22521612)
Extra virgin only means it has been subject to the least amount of filtering standard to the industry. This gives it the most flavour of the olive oils.