Brazilian floral honeys: physicochemical, phenolic compounds, organic acids, and mineral characterization

The comprehensive characterization of floral honeys enables a deeper understanding of their chemical composition and biological potential, which improves the market value of these honeys. This study evaluated in ten Brazilian commercial floral honeys the physicochemical characteristics (moisture, water activity, free acidity, pH, glucose, fructose, and sucrose, 5-(hydroxymethyl) furfural, diastase activity, color intensity, and electrical conductivity), aliphatic organic acids, mineral elements, phenolic compounds, antioxidant activity, and visible spectrophotometric profile. All the honey had differences (p < 0.05) in the physicochemical parameters, but were under international legislation. Gluconic acid was the major organic acid (134.62 ± 0.99–2254.35 ± 126.77 mg 100 g⁻¹), K was the major mineral (184.92 ± 13.71–2271.23 ± 1.63 mg kg⁻¹), and abscisic acid was the major phenolic compound (4.12 ± 3.12 µg g⁻¹–79.62 ± 12.68 µg g⁻¹). Eucalyptus honey presented the highest antioxidant activity, followed by multifloral and Escallonia spp. (canudo-de-pito) honey. Eucalyptus and canudo-de-pito honeys were distant from the other honey samples in the principal components analysis scatterplot (65.21% of the variability of the data explained). These findings contribute to the knowledge of the composition and quality of the floral honeys evaluated.