And it's no wonder. Honey is an excellent source of potassium, and contains calcium, thiamin, riboflavin, iron, magnesium, copper, niacin, and other minerals. It's the perfect natural sweetener: easily digestible and more concentrated than table sugar. And honey's anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and anti-fungal properties have been undisputed for years. Studies have even found it to be more effective at relieving sore throats than over-the-counter cold medicine!

But today, some honey-lovers are getting stung. Many beehives are kept near fields that are sprayed, which means that the pesticides find their way into the honey. Worse, non-organic beekeepers often use sulfa compounds and antibiotics to control bee disease, carbolic acid to remove honey from the hive, and calcium cyanide to kill colonies before extracting the honey. And all of that can eventually travel from the hive to your jar.

One option is to look for USDA certified organic honey, which requires that bees only have access to organic farmland. But because bees can fly up to three miles, this requires farms to be very isolated - and makes organic honey rare (and expensive!).

A sweeter option? Check farmer's markets for locally produced honey--and ask farmers about their practices. Moon Valley's Kim Denend says, "We treat our bees with evergreen oils, and put their hive in the cleanest environment we can find." There's even a health benefit: eating locally produced honey has been shown to minimize the symptoms of hay fever and related pollen allergies.

To fully enjoy the benefits of your local, naturally produced honey, look for ways to incorporate it into your daily diet. Enjoy it stirred into tea, spread it on toast, or substitute it for sugar in your baking.

Interested in purchasing local or organic honey? Visit Snoqualimie Valley Honey Farm online or at Pike Place Market. You can also check out Moon Valley Honey online.