I hadn’t heard of using monk fruit sweetener as a sugar substitute until my sister mentioned she uses it. What are the benefits of using that over anything else? What are your opinions?
I was trying to find a sugar alternative to stevia for someone I know with moderate rheumatoid arthritis. She was drinking about 4 cups of tea a day and always added a packet of stevia. Helped her start an autoimmune diet, and we pinpointed stevia as the biggest source of inflammation.
I don’t have RA, but my knees are sensitive to stevia as well, so after searching, liquid monkfruit sweetener appeared to be the best option. The powdered ones almost always have the sugar alcohol erythritol added to it.
Sugar alcohols can cause GI problems in people, stevia can also do the same. I think these things are dependent on the person, but my goal was to find something with the lowest possibility of causing inflammation. So far monkfruit is the best.
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/monk-fruit-sweetener#benefits
monkfruit or luohan guo It is a plant of the pumpkin family, the curcubitaceae and is used in the dry form in Chinese medicine. As most of the herbs that make up Chinese medicine are little studied in the West and this one only had some research interest for its use as a sweetener, all the rest of the benefits are supposed by the antioxidants of the fruit.