[Sca-cooks] Re: sugar substitutes

[El Hermoso Dormido]

On Tuesday 26 November 2002 06:25 pm, Anne duBosc wrote:
> All these years I've been avoiding foods containing sorbitol because I was
> under the impression that the body processes it the same way it processes
> glucose, so it's really not that good an idea for a diabetic to eat it
> thinking they are avoiding high blood sugar.

As I understand it, this is only true in a very broad sense.  Evidently, the
big difference between the "sugar" the diabetics have to avoid (mainly [only?]
dextrose [which is just a synonym for glucose!] and sucrose [which is a
disaccharide made up of glucose and fructose] but evidently not plain
fructose) and sugar alcohols is their affect on blood sugar (glucose) levels.

Sugar alcohols get digested just fine, so they are NOT non-caloric, but they
are processed more slowly, so you don't get the big spike in blood-sugar
level all at once that you do with sugars that directly put glucose into
the system.

> For the most
> part, I avoid anything with artificial sweeteners.  (except my Diet Coke.)
> I find the taste almost universally yuckky.

I used to be this way as well.  One of my main dietary weaknesses is that
unless I am EXTREMELY thirsty (and it takes a considerable amount of
dehydration to make me feel that thirsty) I just don't like the taste of
a non-sweet beverage.  I used to drink quite a lot of High Fructose Corn Syrup
which I'm sure didn't help my fat level.  One day I decided I was getting WAY
too fat (even for me) so I started "cutting" my regular soda with diet soda.
After increasing the proportion of diet soda over a period of time I
eventually got to the point where NOW I can't stand the taste of High
Fructose Corn Syrup but aspartame or sucralose and/or acesulfame K sweetened
beverages taste fine to me.  Strange.

Oh, and best tasting diet soda, in my opinion: diet cherry coke.
Unfortunately, it ONLY seems to be available as expensive 6-packs, so
I rarely bother.  Diet RC is good, too, if you can find it.

On those rare occasions you can find them, I still do like sucrose-sweetened
beverages, but it seems no major bottler uses it any more...

> Unfortunately, the only thing that
> seems to really work is a REALLY low calorie diet, and huge amounts of
> exercise.

For me, intense strength-training type exercises seem to be the only effective
thing to get me leaner.  At one time I'd tried really low calorie intake with
moderate exercise (lots of walking) and it just seemed not to do any good, but
on the rare occasions when I can get myself to do regular strength-training
type exercises it makes a noticeable difference.

Signed,
El Hermoso Dormido, ugly fat balding old man, who just tonight got dragged off
to a health club to play with the weight machines, and who therefore may
someday be an ugly MUSCULAR balding old man...