Guest Author - Carolyn Chambers Clark, ARNP, EdD

What's wrong with sugars and sweeteners?

Sucrose, or table sugar, is correlated with weight gain and so is fructose. Both sucrose (table sugar from sugar cane or sugar beets) and fructose (fruit sugar that has been concentrated and dried down into crystals that resemble sugar) are correlated with liver stress. A recent article in Nutrition Metabolism contained an article citing a connection between the advent of the obesity epidemic and the introduction of high fructose corn syrup into the food supply. An article in the Journal of the American Medical Association described how the higher consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages is associated with a more weight gain and increased risk for development of type 2 diabetes in women, because of the excess calories and rapidly absorbable sugars.

Some experts claim sugar gives you a high that over-stimulates your adrenal glands, but then puts you into a low that makes you feel fatigued, fuzzy-headed and desperate for your next sugar fix.

What to use instead of sugar

Two natural sweeteners, stevia and molasses are both better alternative sweeteners to sucrose or fructose.

What is stevia?

Stevia is a natural plant glycoside that has been used as a sweetener in Japan for more than 20 years. You can put a few drops in a high-protein drink or cup of tea or use it to cook with. It also comes in crystals, that look like sugar.

Numerous studies have shown it lowers blood pressure, treats diabetes (in animals), has no side effects, is well-tolerated, is well-suited for people with diabetes and PKU, as well as anyone who is trying to lose weight. No allergic reactions to it seem to exist. Animal studies show it may even inhibit skin tumors.

Where do you get stevia?

You can buy liquid stevia at a health food store or for crystals in packets, click on stevia

What does molasses do that sugars can't?

By the time sugars like fructose and sucrose get to you in foods, any nutritious elements have already been processed out of them. Molasses is relatively unprocessed. It has a sweet, slightly iron taste. One study showed that molasses increases the HDL cholesterol that protects against heart disease. Molasses has many constituents that can protect your health including:

* iron (helps oxygenate red blood cells, essential for forming enzymes, important for growth, required for health immune system to ward off infection)

* copper (helps form blood, bone and red blood cells; helps form elastin to keep skin supple; needed for healthy nerves and joints; gives hair its color, helps with taste sensitivity, involved in the healing process)

* chromium (helps maintain normal blood sugar levels, protects against anxiety and fatigue)

* calcium (maintains regular heart beat, lowers cholesterol levels, prevents muscle cramps, helps with bone growth, essential in blood clotting, helps prevent cancer, may lower blood pressure, prevent osteoporosis, helps keep skin healthy, protects against preeclampsia during pregnancy---the number one cause of maternal death)

* magnesium (reduces and dissolves kidney stones, helps form bone, may help prevent heart and blood vessel disease and osteoporosis, may protect against certain forms of cancer and may reduce cholesterol levels, can prevent premature labor and convulsions in pregnant women)

* potassium (for heart health; protects against some kinds of dizziness, weakness and fatigue, headaches and respiratory distress)

* selenium (protects against infection)

* vitamin B6 (protects against arthritis, allergies, headaches, dry skin)

* PABA (a B-vitamin that protects against depression, fatigue and gray hair)

* vitamin K (protects you against bleeding and hemorrhaging)

Where do you get molasses?

You may be able to find molasses at your grocery store, and for sure you can find it at the health food store. Use the kind that says blackstrap molasses.

How to use molasses

Molasses can be used to sweeten drinks, beans, muffins and other baked goods.

Sources:

Balch and Balch. Prescription for Nutritional Healing. Garden City Park NY: Avery Publishing Group.
Basciano and others. Fructose, insulin resistance, and metabolic dyslipidemia. Nutrition Metabolism, 2005. February 21; 2(1):5.
Chan and others. A doule-blind placebo-controlled study of the effectiveness and tolerability of oral stevoiside in huam hypertension. British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. 2000 September; 50(1):215-220.
Geuns, JM. Stevioside. Phytochemistry. 2003. November; 64(5):913-921.
Gregersen and others. Antihyperglycemic effects of stevioside in type 2 diabetic subjects. Metabolism. 2004 January; 53(1):73-76.
Havel, PJ. Dietary fructose: implications for dysregulation of energy homeostasis and lipid/carbohydrate metabolism. 2005 May 63(5):133-157.
Jeppesen and others. Antihyperglycemic and blood pressure-reducing effects of stevioside in the diabetic Goto-Kakizakt rat. Metabolism. 2003 March; 52(3):372-378.
Schlegelmilch and others. Molasses increases HDL cholesterol in rats. International Journal of vitamin and Nutritional Research. 2005 May: 75(3):211-217.
Schulze and others. Sugar-sweetened beverages, weight gain, and incidence of type 2 diabetes in young and middle-aged women. Journal of the American Medical Association. 2004 August 25; 292(8):927-934.
Wei and others. Fructose selectively modulates c-jun N-Terminal kuiase activity and insulin signaling in rat primary hepatocytes. Journal of Nutrition 2005 July; 135(7):1642-1646.
Yasukawa and others. Inhibitory effect of stevioside on tumor promotion by 12-9-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate in two-stage carcinogenesis in mouse skin. Biology and Pharmacy Bulletin. 2005 November; 25(11):1488-1490.