Health & F tness Sugar-Free

By Tehila Soskel, RDN, CDN

Sugar-free sounds like the best option when you are monitoring your sugar intake, although that does not necessarily mean the food product is healthier.

Many foods contain naturally occurring sugar such as fruits and dairy products. Fructose is the name for the sugar found in fruits, and lactose is the name of sugar in milk products.

Added sugars are incorporated during the processing or preparation of the food item, as the name implies. Consuming too many added sugars can lead to numerous health problems like obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. A 20-ounce sugar-sweetened beverage like lemonade or soda can contain around 65 grams of sugar – to put that into perspective, that’s around 16 teaspoons of sugar! More so, it’s usually high fructose syrup that is used as the sweetener. You wouldn’t add 16 teaspoons of sugar to your coffee or tea so why drink a soda or beverage with that much sugar?

When you are reading the nutrition facts on the food label, you want to look out for the added sugars. The most common names for added sugar are corn syrup, high fructose concentrates, molasses, sucrose, and more. According to The American Heart Association , they recommend a limit of 24 grams of sugar for women and 36 grams of sugar for men daily.

As with most things, sugar in moderation sugar can be OK, but it’s crucial to limit added sugars as they only contribute extra calories to the food item with no nutritional benefits. By reducing the amount of added sugar in your diet, you decrease a significant amount of calories consumed and it may help with weight loss as well as improving your heart health.

Reducing Added Sugar

Try drinking mostly water, natural seltzer, and tea, and limit or avoid sugary drinks. Another easy swap is choosing plain yogurt and adding your own fruit and a dash of cinnamon instead of the fla- vored yogurts that usually contain lots of added sugars. With baking, you can try reducing the amount of sugar you usually use in a recipe or substitute the sugar with mashed banana or unsweetened applesauce.

The more consistent you are with reducing your sugar intake, the more you may start to notice less sugar cravings, as well as certain foods becoming too sweet for you. Our taste buds can adjust to the sweetness levels!

Health Claims

A food item claiming to be sugar-free means there is less than 0.5 grams of sugar per serving. Less or reduced sugar means that compared to the similar product, there is 25 percent less sugar. As it sounds, no added sugars means the only sugar is from the food itself – there’s no sugar added. It’s helpful to be familiar with what these claims mean when we’re looking at the nutrition labels as well as the labels on the packaging.

Artificial Sweeteners

Let’s shift into a popular topic: artificial sweeteners or sugar substitutes.

Seeing that delicious fluffy cake or crispy cookie and hearing that it is sugar-free sounds great because you may think that makes it “healthy.” Well, that’s not always the case.

Artificial sweeteners add intense sweetness to food items with almost zero calories. Some can add up to thousand times the amount of sweetness than table sugar.

The most common artificial sweeteners are aspartame, saccharin, sucralose, and a few others. Aspartame, also known as Equal, is 200 times sweeter than table sugar. Saccharin is sold under the name Sweet’N Low and is 700 times the sweetness than table sugar. Sucralose, or Splenda, is 600 times sweeter than table sugar. Because these artificial sweeteners are so much more sweet than table sugar, only a little bit is really needed.

While many people choose artificial sweeteners when they are trying to lose weight, there are studies that found that consuming too much may cause weight gain, increased risk for obesity, diabetes, and other serious diseases. Cutting out added sugars may help your body crave sugar less but that doesn’t mean we should replace it with artificial sweeteners. There have been studies that suggest consuming artificial sweeteners may actually cause an increase in hunger as you may need more of a food item artificially sweetened than the naturally sweetened one.

Nevertheless, foods with artificial ingredients containing less calories may reduce your total calorie intake for the day as opposed to consuming food with added sugar.

Individuals who have diabetes and need to monitor their blood sugar may benefit from sugar substitutes like Truvia or monk fruit instead of table sugar as those sweeteners shouldn’t cause a rise in blood sugar levels like table sugar would. With that being said, it doesn’t mean you should choose to drink diet sodas, as there is no nutritional benefit and they are full of additives.

A healthy functioning gut is super important to your health. Some effects of poor gut health are weakened immune system, weight gain, lack of blood sugar control, and disrupted sleep. What you eat affects your gut, especially certain artificial sweeteners. While not everyone gets affected, common side effects of artificial sweeteners are bloating and gas.

Artificial sweeteners are tested by the U.S. Food and Drug Association to make sure they are safe to consume. If you find that you do not react well to them, then avoid them. If you’re looking for alternatives to artificial sweeteners, then try using natural sweeteners like maple syrup or agave nectar instead.

A little bit of sugar as well as a little bit of artificial sweetener may be fine for some but test yourselves and see how you can make some swaps to decrease your overall sugar intake. You might be surprised!

Tehila Soskel is a registered dietitian nutritionist with a private practice in the Five Towns. She sees clients for weight loss, diabetes, and other various diseases. Appointments can be made for in-person or virtual sessions: 516-457-8558, tehilasoskelrd@gmail.com, tehilasoskelnutrition.com.