Whether you are thinking of going on a diet to lose weight or modifying your eating habits for healthier ones, sugar is an ingredient that you will have to reduce in your menu. The refined (white) sugar that we normally eat is an ingredient that, due to industrial procedures, has hardly any nutrients but does have calories and increases our sugar levels in the body, causing imbalances and problems in people who suffer from diabetes. In this article, we tell you how to replace sugar by informing you about the main substitutes as well as giving you tips that will reduce your daily intake of sugar.
Steps to follow:
Step: 1
It is true that sugar comes from nature: it is from sugar cane that the sugary components that later reach our homes are extracted. However, there is a huge difference between natural sugar and the one that reaches our table and that is that, after going through all the industrial processes, this ingredient has seen its content modified so much that it hardly has a trace of any nutrient for our body.
In other words, eating refined sugar consists only of eating calories: no vitamins or minerals enter your body. This is the main reason why more and more people are choosing to replace sugar in their diet and look for other healthier alternatives that are less harmful to health.
Step: 2
One of the most commercialized and widespread sugar substitutes throughout the world is sweeteners, either in its liquid or powder form. This product only works to sweeten food without adding calories; This fact made it become a revolutionary element since it allowed us to prepare traditional meals while considerably reducing the calories of the recipes.
However, today the fame of the sweetener has declined; The reason is that it is a chemical, a product created to sweeten food but without any vitamin or nutritional contribution and with many chemical products that seriously harm our health. It is for this reason that now, most of us, choose to consume natural sugar substitutes and banish both refined and sweeteners.
Step: 3
Sugar can be replaced naturally with stevia, a plant that is becoming very fashionable today. The reason for the success of stevia is that it is a 100% natural sweetener that is extracted from the leaves of a plant found in Paraguay and Brazil. It can be found both in liquid and powdered form and its sweetness is 300 times greater than sucrose from sugar, so with much less quantity you can make your dishes sweet and delicious.
The best thing about stevia is that it is a natural ingredient that does not provide calories, sugar or carbohydrates, so it can be taken safely if you want to lose weight. In addition, being a natural product, it contains optimal nutrients and vitamins for our body. In this article, we tell you how to replace sugar with stevia.
Step: 4
Another option to stop taking sugar is to replace it with honey, a natural ingredient that also helps to sweeten our dishes by providing us with essential nutrients for our bodies. Although honey is a product that contains calories, it is a perfect ingredient to reduce sugar intake, sweeten our recipes and benefit from vitamins.
One of the most important facts is that very little amount of honey is needed to achieve the desired sweetness in dishes. In fact, there are different tricks to lose weight with honey.
Step: 5
Another way to replace sugar is with dextrose, a component that is extracted directly from corn and can be found in liquid or powdered form. It is a monosaccharide or a “simple sugar” that is becoming more popular among people who want to change sugar naturally.
Step: 6
Xylitol is also another natural component that serves as a sugar substitute and is also suitable for dieters. The reason is that xylitol contains 40% fewer calories than sugar and is even believed to be made up of a beneficial component for dental health. The taste of this ingredient is very similar to sugar and it is for this reason that more and more people are adept at this product.
Step: 7
In the area of Mexico, agave nectar is also becoming popular as a way to replace sugar in the diet. This component is a sweetener that comes from different types of agave plant in Mexico. It has a consistency very similar to honey and its glycemic index is much lower than that of sugar. At a caloric level, this nectar is not suitable for diets as it contains portions similar to those of sugar (about 50 kcal per teaspoon).
Step: 8
In addition to replacing sugar with other ingredients of natural origin, you can also change some of your eating habits, thereby reducing the consumption of sugar in your diet. Here are some examples in this regard:
- Stop taking prepared jams and make yourself a fruit puree.
- Swap milk chocolate for dark chocolate and you’ll be cutting out a lot of added sugars that this product doesn’t have by itself.
- Make your snacks fruit-based: in this way you will satisfy your body with natural sugars and you will not be tempted to eat a snack or chocolate.
- Banish the syrup in your diet and choose to eat the fruits in their natural appearance.
