How We TestEvery Batch
Every jar of Tayab honey passes through three independent testing stages before release. Bioactivity screening measures its bioactive strength. Compliance and safety testing confirms it's clean. Authenticity verification confirms it's real.
Every batch starts with bioactivity screening — measuring Total Phenolic Content and DPPH antioxidant activity, the foundation of our Honey Bioactivity Index.
Physicochemical Profile
Core chemical measurements including moisture, HMF, diastase activity (Phadebas method), free acidity, electrical conductivity, pH, and sugar profile.
Each marker flags a different risk. Moisture above safe levels risks fermentation. HMF rises with heat or age, flagging overheating or poor storage. Diastase activity, a natural enzyme, degrades with heat, so its presence indicates the honey wasn't overprocessed. Free acidity and sugar profile round out the standard picture of a honey's natural composition.
Whether the honey has been handled and stored correctly, not overheated or altered.
Pesticide Screening
A multi-residue panel screening for more than 650 individual pesticide and acaricide substances, including targeted testing for common beekeeping treatments like amitraz, coumaphos, and tau-fluvalinate.
Bees forage freely, so pesticide residues can enter honey from nearby treated crops or from chemicals used inside the hive itself.
The batch is free of measurable pesticide contamination across this panel.
Antibiotic Screening
Testing across 10 veterinary drug classes, including amphenicols, sulfonamides, tetracyclines, macrolides, fluoroquinolones, nitrofuran metabolites, nitroimidazoles, dapsone, streptomycin, and dihydrostreptomycin.
These are sometimes used to treat disease in beehives, and several are restricted or banned in food products in major markets.
No antibiotic residue from hive treatment has carried into the honey.
Heavy Metals
Testing for lead, cadmium, mercury, and arsenic.
Metals can accumulate in honey from polluted soil, water, or air near hives.
The honey is within international heavy metal safety thresholds.
Authenticity Parameters
A comprehensive authenticity panel (SOTA Premium) covering detection of foreign sugars (LC-HRMS), isotope ratio analysis (13C, EA/LC-IRMS), pollen analysis for geographical and botanical origin, proteomic analysis of foreign enzymes, and 1H-NMR profiling.
Adulteration and mislabeling can take several different forms, added syrup, disguised geographical origin, or foreign enzymes used to mask reprocessing. A single test can miss one of these while catching another, so we run a combined panel rather than relying on any one method alone.
Confirms the honey's authenticity, origin, and composition through multiple independent methods, not a single check.