Everything but White Sugar (Road to Healthy part 17)

Hello :)

Today I felt a little inspired, while I went through a cookbook I own about heathier deserts, and I figured I could share all of the alternatives to white sugar that I can think of and bring out some of the benefits they have.

As many of you probably know, white sugar is considered unhealthy, since it's basicly just empty calories, that meaning that you don't get a many nutrients out of it, it's been heavily processed and during that all of the "good stuff" found in sugar cane, is gone.

I'm going to start with one of my favourites, which is coconut sugar, I have actually used it and I like it a lot. It has a slightly caramel-like flavour, while it's also sort of smoky, I don't know how else to describe it, it doesn't taste like coconut, for sure. It's actually made out of the nectar in the blossoms of coconut. It contains a variety of different nutrients, some that I can remember from the top of my head are Magnesium, Zinc, and Iron, but there are actually many more. It can be used in baking as any other type of sugar and I actually also use it in savoury dishes, it weirdly even goes well with those. Coconut sugar has a lower glycemic index than white sugar, whether it's of any importance to you, is completely indiviual of course, I know that some people don't think it's as important, but this isn't a blog post about that.

Maple Syrup, I must admit, I have just drunk it on it's own and I didn't find it too sweet, but I know people who felt sick after just trying it, so I guess it depends on how much of a sweet tooth you have. Inside dishes it's perfectly fine though. I imagine it can be used just the same way as you would use honey in baking or sweetening different deserts. I haven't got a lot of experience in using it, but I do know that it's usually very high in Zinc and Manganese.

I guess, I could also mention Honey then, there are some disagreements on this one, but generally honey is known to be antibacterial for example, good to have when you have a cold, also good for the skin, when it comes to cooking, you can use it while your baking, a little bit in some teas is nice and it can be drizzled over deserts, so it works well for that. The micronutrient content depends on the type of honey, as in which flowers the honey comes from, but generally it has Vitamin C, Iron and Calcium in it.

Agave Syrup, is one that I have not used, but now that I have read a bit about it, I am intrigued, it's supposed to have a slightly milder flavour, it's made out of the juice of the Agave Cactus, which sounds interesting, it can be used instead of honey and it can be used in drinks as well, so I think once I've ran out of all of my white sugar replacers, I might try this one as well.

Another one that I have not used personally, is Stevia, it can be bought in the form of a syrup or powder and it has a very intense sweet flavour, the benefit of this one, is obviously that it has no calories, it however isn't a chemical mystery made to sweeten everything, it's actually made out of the leaves of a plant, which we have tried to grow ourselves at home, but have yet to succeed, however I know it's very sweet and it can be used in deserts, while baking and I'm sure it'd be fine for sweetening drinks as well. It is very very sweet, much sweeter than sugar, so if you use that, bare that in mind.

Obviously there are also plenty of less refined sugars, like brown sugars for example, which have more nutrients left in them, while buying those, it's important to read from the label, if it's really unrefined sugar or just white sugar that has been dyed brown with molasse. Some of the sugars good for baking, would be Muscovado and Demera.

As a little reminder, I just want to say, that eventhough these sugars are healthier, they should be still consumed in moderation, it's perfectly fine to have them every now and then, but as with everything, if you have too much of them, they'll end up affecting yout health. I know there are a lot of extreme diets/lifestyles, some that say eat a lot of sugar, other say don't eat any sugar at all and at both ends there are people who prove that they eat that way and they're perfectly fine. I think that's the perfect example of different things working for different people.

Naturally we crave the high fat high sugar foods, beacuse they're a high source of energy and we used to need that, a lot at once, because we used to not know when the next meal was going to be, but let's face it we know now, so eat everything in a balanced way and find out what makes you feel the best, that's all for today.

Kaiela :)