Our local Walmart has Pyure organic liquid stevia. It’s right there on the shelf with the other sugar substitutes. Our local Kroger has SweetLeaf Sweet drops which is also liquid stevia. That’s in the health foods section of our Kroger, it may vary.
It’s pretty amazing what I’ve found hiding in obscure places on the grocery store shelves.
Less important to me than carbs, as a food addict in recovery, is to lose the dependence on the overly sweet taste that fueled my addiction.
Once I got off the artificial sweetness, then I could build my “new normal” food template and stay away from the fake sweet fat bombs, diet coke, and other things that were not foods of my ancestors.
I still have 85% chocolate or berries in the summer. Retraining my palate made a huge difference in my weight maintenance (68+ pounds almost 6 years off)
I’ve been looking suspiciously at a bag of erythritol I bought, and erythritol doesn’t get transported into cells thereby preventing an insulin response so … I’m wondering if a supplier is cutting their “100% erythritol” with something else.
I was advised by my Doc to check levels upon waking and wait 2 hours after ingestion and check again. This will give you the numbers to compare.
My trainer says no to erythritol and sugar alcohols while on keto. And my son sees a functional medicine doctor who says the only sweeteners that are keto friendly are monk fruit and stevia.
To make things more confusing, I’m pretty sure Megan Ramos says their experience at IDM is that Stevia is the worst for insulin response in most of their patients.
Actually, that’s rather interesting. And I would have to take it one step farther and wonder whether they’re talking about having a sweetened drink, for example, between meals, or whether they’re talking about having a little stevia in the morning breakfast coffee rather than no stevia in the morning breakfast coffee.
In other words, is the stevia out there all on it’s own or is it in combination with a full meal of numerous other things?
I can visualize how it could have more of an impact overall if it is being used more as a “snack”, between meals, and it gives a little boost to the BS/insulin levels. That would be almost like having another small meal. But wouldn’t it be more of a fart in a windstorm if it were, as I mentioned above, used as a bit of sweetener in the coffee when we are already eating a meal?
I don’t really know for sure but I would think context could matter, at least to some extent. I don’t generally have stevia except with a meal. In between meals is just lemon infused water, no sweetener, or just plain water, rarely anything else. Just about always it’s in my coffee. And if I have a muffin or something like that, there is likely to be some in that, too. But again, those aren’t meals, they’re more like “happy endings”.
"In fact, the evidence is mounting that stevia actually is an insulin sensitizer that can aid in glucose tolerance and clearance after a meal. The Japanese have been using stevia for decades in the treatment of type 2 diabetics. Let’s look at a few recent studies. In fructose-fed rats, a single instance of oral stevioside increased insulin sensitivity and reduced postprandial blood glucose in a dose-dependent manner. The same study also found that diabetic rats given stevioside required less exogenous insulin for the same effect. Taken together, these results suggest that stevia may not just be a good sugar substitute for diabetics, but an effective supplement for treatment of their insulin resistance.
Another study looked at the postprandial effects of stevia, sucrose, and aspartame in human subjects. Compared to sucrose eaters, stevia eaters showed lower postprandial blood sugar levels. Compared to both sucrose and aspartame eaters, stevia eaters had far lower postprandial insulin levels. Furthermore, eating stevia did not induce increased appetite throughout the day, indicating stable blood sugar and satiety levels. Another strike in stevia’s favor."
There are other potential benefits to using stevia unrelated to its apparent benefits on glycemic control.
When combined with inulin, a soluble prebiotic fiber, low-dose stevia increased HDL while lowering overall lipids in male rats. Alone, low-dose stevia lowered cholesterol without the potentially beneficial effect on HDL.
Atherosclerosis was reduced in the stevioside-treated mice.
Memory deficit was largely reversed with administration of stevioside, which also reduced the brain oxidative damage caused by scopolamine.
oral stevioside intake significantly reduced systolic and diastolic blood pressure.
Not really, but I don’t really like erythritol. Xylitol has carbs though, so of course it’s my favorite sugar alternative. I’m going to try some allulose next though. I hear it’s almost as good as xylitol and has basically zero BG impact.
Edit: I ate a fair amount of xylitol last weekend. While it never knocked me out of ketosis, it did awaken my sugar cravings something fierce. Gotta be careful with that stuff, and probably all the other sweeteners too.
Is everyone thought about the effect of the erythritol to the level of insulin with the carbs(e.g. hamburger) included diet? It is proven that your level of insulin will surge more 20% with the carbs(e.g. hamburger) included diet than one without erythritol.
I’m confused about that.
Can you pls reference the studies that “prove” insulin surges more when eating erythritol.
I love it when someone says something is proven. If there is one thing we have learnt it must be that anything “proven” in nutritional science needs to be questioned, challenged and aggressively attacked (like, proper science), because we have been caught out too many times by eminency trumping real science.
