I thought I had finally found a healthy drink I liked with no artificial sweetness and they had to go and fuck it up

    • 0oWow@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      Might not be artificial, but it doesn’t look natural in sweetener form:

      The process of extracting stevia -

      Dried stevia leaves are subjected to purified water first. Then followed by a precipitation process with ferric chloride and calcium hydroxide to remove non-soluble plant materials & other impurities and follow filtration.

      Then the leaf extract goes through an adsorption resin, which is used to trap the steviol glycosides of the leaf extract.

      Afterward, wash the resin with ethanol to release steviol glycosides and decolorize the resulting solution with activated carbon to remove the colors in leaves, and then concentrated by evaporation.

      Again, go through the process of decolorization, filtration and spray-drying. The spray-dried product is then combined with similarly processed additional extracts, dissolved in ethanol and/or methanol, crystallized and filtered. Finally, after further processes of crystallization, filtered and spray-dried to obtain pure stevioside.

      Taken from here: https://foodadditives.net/natural-sweeteners/stevioside/#easy-footnote-bottom-1-1949

      • usernamefactory@lemmy.ca
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        4 days ago

        Dried stevia leaves are subjected to purified water first. Then followed by a precipitation process with ferric chloride and calcium hydroxide to remove non-soluble plant materials & other impurities and follow filtration.

        So they’re washed with soap and water? Must we use the scariest language possible here?

    • YamahaRevstar@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      Stevia is DISGUSTING and by far the worst non-sugar sweetener. Aspartame is good in my opinion.

      • Ebby@lemmy.ssba.com
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        6 days ago

        It’s interesting to read people’s reactions to stevia. I don’t seem to have the same reactions/aftertaste others point out.

        I much prefer stevia over other sweeteners. I wonder if there is some sort of cilantro type thing going on.

        Edit: Turns out stevia can taste different to other people!

      • tal@lemmy.today
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        6 days ago

        Stevia does have a bit of an aftertaste, but it’s fine for me in, say, coffee.

        IIRC, the major limiting issue with aspartame is that it’s not heat-stable to the degree that sugar is, so there are a bunch of products that are made with sugar that you can’t make with aspartame, problem for baking.

        kagis

        Yeah:

        https://www.fda.gov/food/food-additives-petitions/aspartame-and-other-sweeteners-food

        Aspartame is not heat stable and loses its sweetness when heated, so it typically isn’t used in baked goods.

        There is no one alternative sweetener that has all of sugar’s properties, just without the calories, which is what people really want.

        Stevia has the aftertaste. Aspartame isn’t heat stable. A lot of the sugar alcohols – like xylitol, which is really common in sugar-free candy – are laxatives, so if you eat that whole bag of candy, you are going to have horrendous diarrhea. You gotta use a patchwork of alternative sweeteners to replace sugar, based on the properties of a particular sugar use.

      • WIZARD POPE💫@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        I prefer stevia to just regular sugar. I go out of my way when buying soda to get ones with stevia because they just taste better.

      • nixfreak@sopuli.xyz
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        6 days ago

        You do realize manufactures have to wear gas masks when pouring in that junk right?

      • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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        6 days ago

        Why wouldn’t you just use sugar

        If you are going to mistreat your body then go big or go home.

        • YamahaRevstar@lemmy.world
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          6 days ago

          Added sugar is considerably worse for you than any zero calorie sweetener. Don’t give me that IT’S CHEMICALS bullshit either. Aspartame is one of the most tested food additive world wide and it’s not found to be unsafe.

          • thejml@lemm.ee
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            6 days ago

            Aspartame gives me headaches. Like “I can’t interact with people” headaches. I’ve tried it a few times and it’s always directly afterwards.

            That said Stevia gives me a reaction like I had 5x the same amount of sugar, so I just have to remember if I’m adding it to something don’t use much or I’ll be hyper and then crash terribly. But at least I don’t get headaches.

            Sugar gives me no problems if I have it in moderation. I generally drink water, but if I have a soda, I have one and I’m done. It’s a treat, not a way of life. Drink water people, it’s actually good for you.

          • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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            6 days ago

            It is all really terrible for you in the long run. There are phycological impacts of sweetness.

            Also drinking anything heavily flavored is problematic for your kidneys and heart. A little coffee or tea isn’t a problem but if you start drinking Soda as a water replacement it will come back to bite you.

            I do agree that terms “artificial”, “chemicals”, “non GMO” and “organic” are BS. Ultimately it is more phycological than anything.