Sugar substitutes – the complete guide
At first sight, sugar substitutes look like the godsend for everyone who wants to limit their sugar consumption and thereby shed lots of excess kilograms. But which sugar substitutes should you pick? Are they even healthy?
Is sugar evil?
Yes, for most people it’s indeed a bad idea to eat sugar. Because sugar is vengeful – consuming it influences your brain and causes cravings. When having sugar, be it regular table sugar or high fructose corn syrup, the neurotransmitters in your brain are influenced in such a way that getting massive cravings is only a matter of time.
It’s like a chain reaction. The level of hunger-suppressing hormones drops, while eating satisfies less and less. You keep on eating but you never feel full. The number of calories eaten increases, which in turn causes excess weight.
Are some sugar substitutes healthier than others?
Sugar substitutes vary a lot – there are natural as well as synthetic ones. The choice is enormous, starting from stevia and agave syrup, ending with aspartame and erythritols. In general, the opinion is that natural sugar substitutes are healthier than the chemically synthesised options.
There are lots of stories and legends circulating about sugar substitutes. Some researches declare them all to be damaging, others state the opposite – health benefits. I like a point I once heard made, that compared having sugar substitutes to flying – 99.999999% of the time, your flight will land successfully and without issues, but there’s still a minuscule chance of something going wrong.
It’s entirely possible that our modern science has not yet had the chance to find out everything about sugar substitutes. But we don’t know that right now and still need to rely on what the science says.
At the same time, every adult has every right to make their own final decision.
1. White table sugar
White sugar or sucrose is generally made from sugar cane or sugar beet. The body breaks it down into glucose and fructose. Glucose is converted into glycogen and the cells are filled with energy. When there’s too much of it, the excess is converted into body fat. In cooperation with fructose, it becomes this “nice” sweet substance.
2. Fructose
Fructose (fruit sugar) is brought up a lot in foreign literature, most recently mostly in a negative context. I dare say that moderate fruit consumption and getting fructose from it won’t harm you in any way. But things can turn against you with pure fructose. Fructose consumption may allegedly decrease metabolism efficiency and insulin sensitivity.
3. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS)
The chemical constitution of corn syrup is similar to that of table sugar and it’s used a lot in large industries. Depending on the product, the corn syrup added consists either of 90% fructose and 10% glucose (baking industries) or 55% fructose and 45% glucose (soft drinks).
The largest problem with this syrup is its skill of taking over your brain and forcing you to consume more sugar.
It can also cause an increase of bad cholesterol levels (LDL) and increase body weight. Blood pressure rises and the risk of contracting cardiovascular diseases increases.
4. Agave syrup
Agave syrup is made from the agave plant. In general, agave syrup contains a lot of fructose, up to as much as 85%. Agave syrup is often considered to be suitable for diabetics, because it doesn’t increase insulin levels and having it isn’t much of a problem in small amounts. However, it does become a problem when amounts grow.
5. Honey
Honey which hasn’t been processed a lot does contain glucose and fructose, but also vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. For this reason, it’s better than sugar as a sweetener. At the same time, storebought honey is often processed so much that a lot of useful compounds get lost in the process. When buying honey from a store, select crystallised honey.
6. Stevia
Stevia is a natural calorie-free sweetener, originally from South America. Natural stevia does not cause the secretion of insulin and even improves the sugar tolerance of blood. For this reason, stevia is a suitable sugar substitute for diabetics as well as for people who simply want to cut back their sugar intake. However, the consumption of large amounts has been researched little so far. So try and keep it moderate.
7. Maple syrup
Maple syrup is similar to honey – it contains various antioxidants and minerals (e.g. zinc and manganese). However, maple syrup does contain sugar and a lot of calories, which somewhat overshadows its antioxidant and mineral content. In other words, maple syrup is better than regular sugar but should be consumed in minimal amounts. It’s much easier and healthier to get your minerals and antioxidants from fruit and vegetables.
8. Palm sugar
Palm sugar is made from the crystallised nectar of coconut palm blossoms. Palm sugar is relatively rich in nutrients, containing vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients, including potassium, zinc, iron, vitamins B1, B2, B3 and B6. What speaks in favour of palm sugar is its low glycaemic index (GI 35). Cane sugar’s is twice as high (GI 70), same for honey (GI 55-60). The lower the GI, the more slowly glucose is released into the blood, preventing quick increase of blood sugar. Here I’d also like to draw a parallel with other natural sweeteners – a little bit in some foods is okay, but you shouldn’t take it easy with using them. If you were to constantly drink coffee and tea throughout the day, sweetening them with palm sugar and hoping that your shape won’t suffer (after all, it’s a natural, low GI product) then you’re likely to be wrong. So the way I suggest having it – preferably less often, in small amounts and mixed into food.
9. Sugar alcohols
Xylitol, erythritol, maltitol and mannitol are natural sugar substitutes in the group of sugar alcohols, which do not increase blood sugar levels or cavities. They don’t release insulin and their calorie content is noticeably lower than that of sugar.
However, it should be noted that these sugar substitutes are not quite calorie-free, even though they’re often advertised as such. Erythritol has the lowest calorie content of the lot, containing 0.2 kcal per gram. Xylitol contains 2.4 kcal per gram. Sugar alcohols are less sweet than sugar (around 50-70% of the sweetness of sugar) so they need to be used in larger amounts to achieve a similar sweetness. It has been found that larger amounts may cause problems in the gut.
10. Artificial sugar substitutes
Artificial (chemically obtained) sugar substitutes are particularly controversial. Aspartame, sucralose, saccharine, acesulfame potassium (acesulfame K), neotame are some of the better known ones. They’re entirely calorie free and therefore used in many diet foods. There is lots of research arguing for and against them, and sometimes it feels like the world has been split entirely in half over them.
The following has been written about aspartame (as probably the most famous of this set): in the human digestion tract, aspartame is converted into asparagine acid, phenylalanine and methanol. The two latter are considered undesirable. One person in 10,000 suffers from phenylketonuria and for this reason, labels of foods containing aspartame contain a warning of “contains phenylalanine”. In 2013, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) carried out a reevaluation of the safety of aspartame and concluded that the acceptable daily intake ADI 40 mg per kilogram of body weight per day is enough to protect human health .
It seems like the question here isn’t so much whether they’re good for our health, but rather whether consuming them is bad for our health.
At the same time, many writings from all over the world have highlighted a series of problems that may result in having those artificial sweeteners.
Work with the natural
To sum up, it can be said that the more natural your food, the surer you can be that you’re in good hands. And you can be surer that every bite you eat is to benefit your health.
At the same time, I repeat what I said earlier – as an adult, the final decision is up to you.
Let us know in the comments how you feel about sugar substitutes. And which ones do you prefer to use?
Did you get valuable information from the article? Let us know in the comments!