Hey guys, I’m trying very hard to limit my sugar intake and it got a little crazy over the last year. One of the things I started doing is instead of 2 table spoons of sugar, I do one tablespoon of Kirkland organic strawberry spread. It says 1 tablespoon is 9g so I’m wondering, is it actually better for me ? I don’t know much about how sugar intake works and the difference between cane sugar and sugar from I guess strawberries.
Edit - I add the strawberry jam to my tea
Most of the sugar in jam is added sugar. It looks like Kirkland Organic Strawberry spread has 9g of sugar per serving, including 8g added sugar. That implies that 1g is from the strawberries and 8g is from the added sugar.
This probably won’t really connect but the key to reducing sugar is understanding the relativity of it: have you ever eaten a candy bar then taken a bite of fruit, noticing how unsweet it is? The same thing happens over longer periods of time. Like if you don’t eat much added sugar, you’ll start to taste sweetness in things like peas and milk that sugar-addicts won’t taste as sweet. Your sensory of sweetness is relative. If you truly understand this it should be easier to limit your intake of refined sugars (such as jam) to zero. Using refined sugars is more like borrowing sweetness from the future, and if you want everything to be sweet, is chasing a dragon you can never catch.
Monk fruit/erythritol doesn’t have any after taste like stevia, splenda, equal, etc. It is keto, so no carbs. I love it but i wish it wasn’t so expensive.
Edit: you can also make a quick homemade jam.
> and the difference between cane sugar and sugar from I guess strawberries.
Sugar from fruit takes longer to digest because its encased in fiber. As soon as you process fruit (juice, jam, really anything that involves pressing or heating) you break the sugar out of its fiber prison so its not much different from table sugar (slightly more fructose so slightly worse in some regards).
This is why drinking OJ is not much better then drinking soda.
How bad this is for you really depends on what else you are eating. There are differing guidelines but <36g a day of added sugar is very good and <60g a day of added sugar is ok. Your 2tbsp of spread has you at 16g.
Adding sugar to things isn’t “bad” unless you are eating lots of things with added sugar. TBH I would prefer early death to having my coffee without sugar anyway, I just limit myself to 0.5tsp a cup.
1 tablespoon of sugar has about 15g of carbohydrates. So, with your substitution you are eating 24g of carbs instead of 30. 6g less is better. Strawberry sugar is just sugar and not a better sugar. Consider alternate sweeteners. Keto sources can show you which low carb sweeteners are better.
Edit: I thought you switched to 1 tbl sugar + 1 spread. If switching to just the spread, then this is way better.
Just stop eating sugar. If you want to be healthy in this world of heinously unhealthy food, it takes discipline. There aren’t shortcuts. And no, substituting your sugar for strawberry flavored corn syrup is not doing you favors.
I thought a tsp of sugar was 9g; so yeah - I think that’s better. There are some fiddly things about which -ose is present, etc., but if we’re talking about cutting sugar in half, that is more important.
If you keep it reasonable, you can probably (kind of) burn that off as you go, assuming you’re using this to cope with your appetite. You’re making a pretty gnarly situation for your teeth; just free, simple, sugar and weird tannins from the tea and whatever… Might not be the best thing for your gut.
Keep your eye out for those parts of the day where you are being good, and stretch them out a little. Good luck!
I’m pretty much sugar free.
How did I do it? I slowly weaned myself off. I started cutting sugar out and switched to diet/non-sweetened drinks. Eventually I just cut out sweeteners altogether.
It took a long time. As I did it slowly. Now my palate has changed and a lot of foods just taste too sweet.
Have you looked at trying small amounts of honey in your tea? That has flavor as well as sweetness. Just start with a smaller amount then your normal sugar and slows reduce it.
Good luck!
The main cause for a sugary craving is normally lack of energy. So your body is looking for the quickest way to refuel hence signaling a sugary craving. I am also a sweet tooth so being mindful of this helped me reduce my sugar intake significantly.
When I crave sweets it’s normally when I didn’t eat well or skipped meals. I started to focus on eating more protein rich and Whole Foods. Fueling my body the right way helped reduce the craving BUT we no one’s perfect and I still have those days when I want to add a little dessert to my day. I opt in normally like to for raw honey or 100% organic maple syrup on those days
It’s of hard to really give advice without knowing what your sugar intake is currently, and what foods you eat with the most sugar
As a general rule, you want to limit added sugars to 10% or less of your calorie budget. That may seem like only a little bit but if you are on a 2000 calorie diet (just as an example) that gives you a “budget” of 200 calories, or 50g of sugar.
A teaspoon is 4g (also a sugar packet)
What do you usually eat that tends to have sugar? I personally like to use splenda, monkfruit, sugar free syrup. But it’s really personal preference. Another thing is to look out for things like salad dressings, I tend to go for lower cal dressings because many of their counterparts have a lot of sugar
Edit - as for your question about sugar in cane sugar Vs strawberries… your body treats sugars as the same. Sugar is sugar. The reason we tend to give a bad rap to added/cane sugar is because a lot of people with high sugar diets tend to eat a lot of the added stuff.
Strawberries are generally low sugar fruits, and they have fiber - fiber slows down the absorption of sugar, and fiber also helps with hunger. We tend not to demonize fruit sugar for this reason, because those who eat a lot of sugar tend to not be getting it from fruits (and also because people who consume too much sugar tend to do so in the form of sodas, dressings/sauces, packaged snacks etc)
Whether the sugar comes from the cane or a strawberry makes no difference to your body….if you have too much of either it will bad for you….now, having said that, we buy the raw un-processed sugar, and organic as well….but the real battle comes not in what you use in table spoons or tea spoons but what is in your food that you buy…..the hidden sugar…..and there is most definitely a difference in high-fructose glucose…..which is an engineered sugar product …..try to stick too as little processing as possible…go with the natural food like fruit and vegetables and whole grains…..as the processed food tends to have the added salt and sugar….and worse, the salt based and sugar based chemicals and products…..
What are you putting this stuff on? White bread? Or whole grain?
Can’t you just avoid sweet stuff? Because whether it’s sugar or something else (say an artificial sweetener), in excess, it’ll be bad for you. I rarely use sugar. I use it in my cinnamon swirl bread (to mix with the cinnamon and a little to sweeten the dough a bit) and I use it when I make certain Chinese food dishes. I eat 3-4 bananas a week. I eat the occasional cookie and sometimes eat a brownie or two.
That’s the majority of sugar in my diet.
Anything that’s particularly sweet, is going to give you an insulin spike and unless you have a pretty healthy diet, low in sugar, an insulin spike can do damage. If you have a healthy overall diet, low in sugar, the occasional insulin spike is not a problem.