OK. I'm ranting here. Apologies in advance if you're bothered.

I'm tired of Maltitol (and isomalt, and lactitol, etc..)
It makes me stall. It makes me grossly uncomfortable.

This weekend, I'm at the grocery store. Thought about buying Thin Ice -- but I see a new "Mike's Light" Lemonade beverage. Packaging says 2g carbs. I buy it.
Get home, look closer -- it says 12g carbs. 2g "net". It doesn't say what the other 10g are, but I'm reasonably certain that it's maltitol.

Also this weekend, I go buy my favorite LC bagels from Nutrawize. (Before, they were 1g net per oz of bagel, or about 5g per bagel.) New packaging. I buy them. Get home, look closer. Now it's 3.5g net of carbs per 1/2 bagel. However, a 1/2 bagel serving also contains 2.5g of maltitol. That makes the bagels now 7g net per bagel, with 5g of sugar alcohols. great. Just what I need in the morning to "wake me up". (Along with all of the neighbors.)

Industry, if you're listening -- stop it.
There are plenty of sweeteners and bulking agents on the market which are better for low carbers. Yes, they may make your ingredient formulation a little more difficult, or minimize your profit margin. But you need to do it.

The problem now is that perfectly acceptable (even delicious) products are now reformulating with maltitol because everyone else is doing it.

Maltitol has a glycemic index of between 38 and 50, and 2.7 and 3 calories per gram. This makes it roughly equivalent in carbohydrate level to Rice, or lactose.
When it causes the kind of gastric distress that it does in almost everyone who eats it, why use it at all?!

Stop it.

H

I've only had the sugar alcohols BEFORE I started Aktins (my inlaws had the R Stover lc candies) and they did a horrible number on my system. I felt AWFUL for like two days. Now I make sure that I read labels. Can anyone give me ALL the names for sugar alcohols? I know about the maltitol, but are their other names that they'll use to confuse me?


I do NOT want to buy anything with these in them. Not worth it to me!




dalejr8fan ~

Avoid anything ending in -ol.

Look up at the top of any page. In the orange bar, click on Low Carb Tips. Scroll down to the bottom of the new page to an article on Sugar Alcohols.

And do a google.com on "sugar alcohol" which will bring up LOTS of names.

I really really agree with this....but...it also absolutely keeps me from overdoing anything containing it.

I hate how they say to deduct them, but I don't know too many people who can eat a lot of the candies etc and still lose.

Thank you! I definitely want to avoid them. Taste good going down (the candies do), but are horrid when it's time to make their exit. *shudder*




Brandee ~

I tend to stick to natural foods, so I don't come across Malitol very often.

There is Xylitol in the chewing gum, but I don't have enough of it to give me the runs. Diet Coke here is still sweetened with good old Aspartame and I am fine with it (allthough I do think they should offer a choice of an aspartame free diet coke for those who cannot drink it).

I don't actually remember seeing Malitol used very often here. I think there used to be some cough sweets (Pullmoll) which used a sugar alcohol which gave you the runs, if you had more than half a tin of them. But I can't remember which one that was. It's a long time ago that I ate them.

Thanks for mentioning the low carb tips at the top of the page. I hadn't noticed it.

As for avoiding sugar alcohols, I know I just cannot. I am not ready to forego candies and cakes, especially chocolate. Not all -ols are equal by a long shot. I have found some -ols that are good to me and if I stick to them in moderation (a serving a day) I do fine. Otherwise I get my sweets via fruits, which definitely have to be eaten carefully too. Any way, I know how people feel. It is absolutely frustrating when you stall, and the fact that companies are taking the low road to low carb profits *really* pisses me off.

But I vote for keeping your head and working through the sweets. Sugar alcohols are not the same. They really are not. If you are the kind of person who can tough it out without them at all, all the power to you. But if you need sweet treats in your life, do not think you cannot succeed at your diet. You can. It just takes more knowledge and trial and error.

As far as the companies go, put your money where your mouth is, literally, and buy only the stuff that satisfies your sweet tooth but doesn't sabotage you. Most likely it will cost more, but if we put our money there, the industry will have to change. Either the ingredients will get cheaper because they will get more common, or companies will have to accept lower profits (typical when the consumer is educated about what they are buying).

OoooooO I was just saying to my husband just last week "Why is everything sweetened with an -Ol?"
I bought something saying it was sweetened with Splenda....get it home and its main sweetner was still an "ol" grrrrr....they do give me the runs or gas...Most times I can't even eat the whole serving size w/out it affecting me. Again grrrrrr.

The following site has a lot of info about sugar alcohols, including a chart containing a list of them, and their average caloric content and Glycemic Index values.

http://www.mendosa.com/netcarbs.htm

I was thinking the same thing. Saw LC Easter candy (marshmallow eggs) and looked at the back. 47 g of carbs! 46 g of malitol! They went back on the shelf, fast!

Watch out for Erythritol also, it is a sugar alcohol but its not suposed to have the laxative effect the other "ols" have. ts in ZCarb bars and Carbolite's new At Last! bars.

I just wish there was something they could use that is NOT a chemical. Here I am trying to get healthy and I'm loading my system up with nasty chemicals that God only knows how its going to affect me later on down the road.

Sigh~

Nice double-entrendre in the thread title.

I basically find Splenda too sweet. Try the new Diet Hansen's sodas, and see if you don't agree.

Query whether Tagatose (commercially to be marketed as Gaio in the US) could go into commercial production and distribution and provide another alternative to Splenda and sugar alcohols.

http://www.tagatose.com/

http://www.gaio-tagatose.com/