Splenda, Equal, Sweet’N Low, Sugar in the Raw, Truvia, plain old table sugar. We’ve heard of them and tried them all. Eliminating calories by making the switch from real sugar often means dealing with a fake sugar taste and consuming notorious bad guys like aspartame, found in many sucrose-free sweeteners. Think this sums up your options? Think again. Introducing the newest sweetener to hit the market: natural sweetener from monk fruit. This calorie-free all natural sweetener seems almost too good to be true. It is pure, natural, calorie-free, diabetic safe, and recognized by the FDA. And according to the research, this sweetener is one calorie-free alternative that we can actually embrace for ourselves (and our children) without pumping our bodies full of artificial chemicals.
So what’s the science behind monk fruit sweetness? Basically, monk fruit (a super-fruit in the cucumber and melon families traditionally grown in the mountains of the Guanjxi Province of China) naturally contains an intensely sweet compound called Mogroside V, which is 150 times sweeter than table sugar. Although production was formerly limited to the region in China, which is why you probably haven’t heard of it before now, a company in New Zealand called BioVittoria is now making it available to the Western world. BioVittoria has not only developed a grower network of monk fruit, but it has also developed an efficient method of capturing the sweetness from it so that it may be produced in the familiar white sugar-like form. We can now expect to see monk fruit sweeteners being mass-produced and marketed globally. In fact, companies like Splenda and Sugar in the Raw have already released their versions, which are hitting supermarket shelves now.
Here’s a quick video from BioVittoria which explains the process of harvesting the sweetener from the fruit:
Especially in the United States, where teens drink soda pop like water, kids are constantly consuming sugar-laden processed snacks, and diabetes affects a record number of children and adults each year, we think that monk fruit sweetener is a great sugar alternative. Moms, dads, and sugar-cravers alike take note: this sweetener can be substituted for sugar and artificial sweeteners alike in coffee, tea, baked goods, candies, juices, and carbonated beverages. We definitely plan to try out monk fruit sweetener for ourselves and have already ordered our free sample of the Splenda version, called Nectresse. Get yours here.
Let us know your thoughts on this new sweetener. We want to hear about your experience!
DASHA wellness & spa is a luxury lifestyle brand and New York City-based wellness center created to offer a truly holistic approach to wellness. To learn more, visit dashawellness.com.
