Sugar Alcohols and You

By Sami

Sugar alcohols are used to sweeten all sorts of low-carb products including candies, baked goods, shakes and protein bars. You can even buy maltitol syrup or granular erythritol to do some of your own sugar-free baking. They can be a godsend for those of us who are very sensitive to sugars, or they can become a huge issue if we consume the wrong ones without knowing. The problem here is- not all sugar alcohols are created equal. Let's go over a list of all the sugar alcohols.

Erythritol
Isomalt
Lactitol
Maltitol
Mannitol
Sorbitol
Xylitol

Some of these you may recognize; like sorbitol, maliltol and xylitol. These are probably the most commonly used because they have some of the same properties as sugar. They can harden and crystallize like candy, they dissolve easily, they add bulk to baked goods while being relatively cheap. Unfortunately, these most common ones have been known to affect blood glucose.

Even though companies can claim their products are sugar-free if they use, say, maltitol- that does not mean your body can't turn at least a portion of what you ingest of it into glucose. The only reliable way to know which sugar alcohols are safe to ingest is to look at the glycemic index of each of these.

Erythritol - 0
Isomalt - 2
Lactitol - 6
Maltitol - 52(syrup) 36(powdered)
Mannitol - 0
Sorbitol - 9
Xylitol - 7

It's easy to see that maltitol is the main offender here. The syrup form is almost as glycemic as table sugar, and unfortunately, it's present in nearly every sugar-free candy out there- even ones that claim they're sweetened with erythritol.

It's a sad thing that the most commonly used sugar alcohols also happen to be the ones which will probably spike your blood sugar. But there is good news- erythritol (with a glycemic index of zero) is available in granular form for those of us who want to make truly sugar-free baked goods. A company called Wholesome Sweeteners makes bags of erythritol available to us under the name "Organic Zero."

Wholesome Sweeteners Organic Zero

I love it for baking, although truthfully it does have some issues. Making hard candy out of it has been unsuccessful so far, it seems like it doesn't want to melt and harden into a sheet like sugar will. It also has difficultly dissolving in things, so I powder it in my Magic Bullet before using, and if you add too much to a recipe it has a tendency to fall out of solution and re-crystallize. All these issues aside, there are some advantages to using it. It will extend the life of your baked goods because it won't absorb moisture from the air and get "sticky," and like xylitol, it seems to be healthy for your teeth.