So you have decid­ed to give sug­ar the boot, but you would still like to have a bit of sweet in your life.  You know that con­ven­tion­al sweet­en­ers are unhealthy, but what are the alternatives?

Why is sug­ar bad?  Apart from caus­ing tooth cav­i­ties and mak­ing us pick up weight, sug­ar caus­es large spikes of Insulin, a hor­mone that helps cells absorb sug­ar from the blood stream.  Con­stant high Insulin lev­els increase your chances of Dia­betes, heart dis­ease and can­cer.  Raised Insulin lve­les can also cause hor­mon­al prob­lems like infer­til­i­ty and Poly Cys­tic Ovar­i­an Syn­drome in women and low testos­terone in men that can lead to fatigue and erec­tile dys­func­tion.   Sug­ar is high­ly addic­tive and stim­u­lates the same parts of our brains as drugs like cocaine.

The Good:

Xyl­i­tol is a nat­ur­al low calo­rie sug­ar found in tree bark and is har­vest­ed from birch tree forests or man­u­fac­tured from corn.  The beau­ty of xyl­i­tol is that it doesn’t affect insulin lev­els, so it doesn’t increase chances of devel­op­ing insulin resis­tance, dia­betes or hor­mon­al prob­lems.  Xyl­i­tol has slight antibac­te­r­i­al prop­er­ties and unlike table sug­ar actu­al­ly pre­vents tooth decay.  It is often used in sug­ar free gum, and can be used in bak­ing.  It has a slight­ly cool mouth feel which is dif­fer­ent from table sug­ar, but this effect can be reduced if  used in com­bi­na­tion with Ste­via.  Xyl­i­tol can cause diar­rhoea in large quan­ti­ties, so if your tum­my gets upset when using xyl­i­tol ini­tial­ly, reduce the amount you con­sume per day until your sys­tem adjusts.

Ste­via is extract­ed from a plant called Ste­via rebau­di­ana that grows in Bazil and Paraguai.  It is 600 times sweet­er than sug­ar and con­tains no calo­ries.  Be care­ful of sweet­en­er sachets and tablets made with ste­via as these often con­tain dex­trose (a sug­ar) and sucralose (as dis­cussed above in the ‘worst’ cat­e­go­ry).  Ste­via is best used in a pure pow­der or liq­uid form.  Please be super care­ful how much you use: 6 drops are equal in sweet­ness to a spoon of table sug­ar so it is easy to use too much.  Ste­via is great for bak­ing- use in com­bi­na­tion with xylitol.

Ery­thri­tol is a no calo­rie sweet­en­er that occurs nat­u­ral­ly in some fruit and fer­ment­ed foods.  It is sim­i­lar to xyl­i­tol.  It has less risks of caus­ing diar­rhoea in sus­cep­ti­ble peo­ple because it is absorbed high­er up in the diges­tive tract.  It can cause headaches and slight nau­sea in a small per­cent­age of peo­ple if con­sumed in large quantities.

 

The Not-So-Good:

A lot of nat­ur­al sug­ars sub­sti­tutes are still sug­ars with the same risks as nor­mal table sug­ar.  They might be less refined, but they still cause large insulin spikes and still have the same risks of increas­ing your chances of obe­si­ty, dia­betes, can­cer etc.  Remem­ber that all raw or brown sug­ars are still sug­ar at heart with maybe a bit of caramel or molasses added.

Hon­ey falls into this cat­e­go­ry.  It is a great med­i­c­i­nal sub­stance in raw form to treat ail­ments like sore throats and skin dis­eases.  A spoon of hon­ey made by bees in your area tak­en dai­ly for a few weeks before spring can even help pre­vent hayfever, but hon­ey is still most­ly sug­ar and should not be tak­en dai­ly as a sug­ar substitute.

Agarve is a sug­ar that is made from the same plant that tequi­la is made.  It is a high fruc­tose sug­ar.  Fruc­tose is the sug­ar most com­mon­ly found in fruit, and can be healthy if con­sumed in whole fruit where fibre con­tent slows down sug­ar absorp­tion and the amount con­sumed is lim­it­ed.  Con­cen­trat­ed fruc­tose as is found in Agarve syrup can increase fats in the blood (triglyc­erides) and can cause fat deposits in the liv­er itself (fat­ty liv­er syn­drome) which affects liv­er function.

 

The Ugly:

Sac­cha­rin has been linked to increased chances of devel­op­ing blad­der can­cer in a num­ber of studies.

Aspar­t­a­mine has been linked to weight gain (!) and decreased insulin sen­si­tiv­i­ty, which can lead to insulin resis­tance and ulti­mate­ly type 2 diabetes.

Sucralose was once thought to be the answer to our sug­ar prayers, but is start­ing to not look too good either.  It is made by adding a chlo­rine mol­e­cule to nor­mal table sug­ar which makes it less absorbable.  The prob­lem is that the small per­cent­age that does get absorbed is very dif­fi­cult for your body to get rid of.  Sucralose has been linked to pos­si­ble birth defects, can­cer, and immune dysfunction.

 

Try to do a 10 day Sug­ar detox.  Avoid all sug­ars except for xyl­i­tol, Ste­via and Ery­thri­tol from your diet.  Your sug­ar crav­ings will get less severe each day and will even­tu­al­ly disappear.

 

Keep Well,

Dr Jana