Quality Assessment of Goldenrod, Milkweed and Multifloral Honeys Based on Botanical Origin, Antioxidant Capacity and Mineral Content
Kocsis M, Bodó A, Kőszegi T and others. International journal of molecular sciences, January 2022.
Read the paper Free to read · doi:10.3390/ijms23020769
What this paper is about
Four Hungarian honeys, including one from common milkweed, analysed for their pollen content, antioxidant capacity and minerals.
Milkweed is an invasive weed in Hungary, and its flowers yield enough nectar to produce a named monofloral honey. The light honeys had lower antioxidant capacity than the dark ones.
Summarised here from the abstract below. Not the authors’ words.
Abstract
The goal of the study was to evaluate the pollen spectrum, antioxidant capacity and mineral content of four Hungarian honey types, using multivariate statistical analysis. The light colored honeys were represented by milkweed honey and a multifloral (MF) honey with dominant pollen frequency of linden (MF-Tilia); the darker ones were goldenrod honey and a multifloral honey with Lamiaceae pollen majority (MF-Lamiaceae). The pollen spectrum of the samples was established with melissopalynological analysis. The absorbance of the honeys positively correlated with the antioxidant capacity determined with three of the used methods (TRC, TEAC, DPPH), but not with ORAC. The latter method correlated negatively also with other antioxidant methods and with most of the mineral values. MF-Tilia had high ORAC value, K and Na content. The MF-Lamiaceae had the highest K, Mg, P, S, Cu and Zn content, the last five elements showing strict correlation with the TRC method. The darker goldenrod honey had higher SET values and total mineral content, than the milkweed honey. The above character-sets facilitate identification of each honey type and serve as indicators of variety. The antioxidant levels and mineral content of honeys allowed their clear separation by principal component analysis (PCA).
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Milkweed USA. (2026). Quality Assessment of Goldenrod, Milkweed and Multifloral Honeys Based on Botanical Origin, Antioxidant Capacity and Mineral Content (listing). Retrieved DATE, from https://milkweedusa.com/research/quality-assessment-of-goldenrod-milkweed-and-multifloral-honeys-based-2022/
"Quality Assessment of Goldenrod, Milkweed and Multifloral Honeys Based on Botanical Origin, Antioxidant Capacity and Mineral Content (listing)." Milkweed USA, 2026, https://milkweedusa.com/research/quality-assessment-of-goldenrod-milkweed-and-multifloral-honeys-based-2022/. Accessed DATE.
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title = {Quality Assessment of Goldenrod, Milkweed and Multifloral Honeys Based on Botanical Origin, Antioxidant Capacity and Mineral Content (listing)},
author = {{Milkweed USA}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://milkweedusa.com/research/quality-assessment-of-goldenrod-milkweed-and-multifloral-honeys-based-2022/},
note = {Accessed DATE}
}