Making a sugar free cake with out aspartane

"Splenda" (tm) works very well in my kitchen. Although the package may say it works 1 to 1 as a sugar replacement ratio, I actually use 1 Tbsp. per cup less than that.
If you're looking for sugar free ice cream and haven't experienced what's available, keep in mind that sugar free ice cream is generally pretty nasty stuff. However, I've found that the Blue Bunny no sugar added products are low enough in sugar for the my diabetic friends diets. Check the ingredients on the label (grams of sugar per serving) and see if that will work for you. Assuming, of course, that it's available in your area.

http://www.bluebunny.com/ProductDeta...&productId=392

Try this link for more info.:cool:

You should try using agave nectar or raw honey. My grandmother has diabetes and takes spoonfuls of raw honey every day to balance out glucose (I really don't know exactly *why* she takes it) and I really like using agave nectar at home. It tastes spectacular, and is very light. You should however adjust the moisture content of your cake if using those ingredients.

Edy's no sugar added vanilla is quite good. I have to watch sugar intake (borderline diabetes....) so I don't eat it often or in large amounts.

I also make a sugar-free chocolate sauce that I love. It came about because I was looking for a sugar-free chocolate sauce and tried Hershey's product. It was AWFUL as it was, so I doctored it up. Here are the (approximate) ingredients for two generous servings:

1-1/2 tablespoons Smart Balance margarine
4 teaspoons good quality cocoa powder
3 tablespoons (?) Hershey's Sugar Free Chocolate Sauce
1/2 teaspoon Penzey's vanilla
1 tablespoon half-and-half or cream
2 tablespoons (or to taste) Splenda

Melt the margarine in a small sauce pan. Sprinkle the cocoa in and make a paste. Add the Hershey's sauce, vanilla, cream and Splenda- stirring after adding each ingredient. Serve over ice cream.

This forum is not intended for homeopathic medical advice. The fact or fancy that someone's grandma uses honey to "treat" diabetes doesn't make it safe for diabetics. My wife is a diabetic and, although some homeopathic gurus have recommended it to her, no competent medical authority (neither her endocrinologist, our family doctor nor her nutritionist) has endorsed including honey in her diet. Before you try this suggestion be sure and check with your father's doctor.:mad:

You can believe i'm the last one that believes in homoepathic advice. Hey, how about adding a little foie gras to the cake????

Have you ever *tried* raw honey? It tastes SPECTACULAR and THAT is why I mentioned it. I could care less about nutritional content, so take that.

Bananas are extremely high in naturally occuring sugar. If your father is watching his sugar intake for health reasons, he needs to watch ALL his sugar, not just the white granular variety.

Although some whole food fanatics seemed to be under the misconception that natural sugars are somehow healthier than refined sugars, as far as your body is concerned, it makes no distinction. At least not for people with sugar related illnesses. To someone watching their sugars, all forms of sugar need to be limited.

This includes honey (raw, cooked, baked or fried ;)) bananas, apple sauce, molasses, evaporated cane juice, white grape juice, and many others.

If it ends in "ose", it's sugar: maltose, fructose, sucrose, lactose...... They may be absorbed a bit differently or at slightly different rates, but they can still do the same damage as white sugar.

MMMMMMMM FRIED HONEY!!!

Culprit, you need to remember that just a few years ago these same doctors were pushing trans-fats as the answer too better health, and boy where they wrong.

Stevia, a natural sweetener is used in Japan for sweetening all diet sodas as artificial sweeteners are banned. It was however totally banned from use in the US by the FDA on the basis of one anonymous phone call. It is now available as a supplement, but cannot be mentioned as a sweetener.

Stevia has been proven totally safe in 1000's of years of use, but there is a strong artificial sweetener lobby that had it banned. I use it in my cooking and have found that it have zero effect on my blood sugar levels, and tastes great in it's natural, unprocessed form.

Now both Nutrasweet and Splenda have documented adverse health effects, but are easily obtained and in fact recommended to me by my doctors, so by your way of thinking I should be using them?

I don't think so.

I have diabetes and found out a long time ago that the type of sugar does matter, and the worst of them all is high fructose corn syrup which is found in just about all processed foods.

What really matters is the glycemic index of the item, take a look here glycemicindex.com
So not all sugars are equally evil.

1. Please show me the studies where Splenda produced 'adverse health effects.'

2. Stevia leaves have been used safely for centuries. Stevia extract, the sweetener used in supplements, has a much shorter history. Here are two studies that demonstrate the dangers of stevia extract:

"Metabolically activated steviol, the aglycone of stevioside, is mutagenic". Proc Natl Acad Sci U.S.A. 82 (8): 2478-82.
"Evaluation of the genotoxicity of stevioside and steviol using six in vitro and one in vivo mutagenicity assays". Mutagenesis 11 (6): 573-9.

Please show me the studies that show stevia extract is 'perfectly safe.'

The phrase 'high fructose corn syrup is bad, but low GI is good' is contradictory, as high fructose corn syrup is actually lower GI than table sugar (due to the presence of a slightly larger amount of low GI fructose).

Because of the myriad number of health issues associated with fructose, the glycemic index is a poor barometer for healthy vs. non healthy sugars. It's a jumping off point in understanding the impact of sugars, but it's definitely not the whole picture.

This site has a list of sugar free frostings.

http://www.recipezaar.com/recipes.ph...ree%20frosting

When did I ever say the word "Extract"? Also after looking at those studies I see that the doses used where in excess of 1000 times more than would be used by any sane person.

As for studies showing that anything is "perfectly safe" is a straw man argument, nothing and I mean nothing we eat has been "proven" to be perfectly safe.

Let's take caffeine for example. In commonly practice it is a harmless mild stimulant, but ingest a gram of it, and you drop over dead.

Plan old water will kill, as witnessed just last week in a radio contest in St Louis I believe.

As for the adverse effects of Splenda, how about you offer "proof" it is perfectly safe? It has been linked to migraines, and there are serious questions as to the bodies ability to metabolize it. Also the FDA approved it after very limited studies, two too be exact, the longest of which was only 3 months long and included less than 100 subjects. How is that for "long term"? It was never tested on children or pregnant women, how's that for a safety testing protocol?

I'd love to provide links to these adverse studies, but as I do not have the required number of posts yet to include URL's but just look so them at Pubmed.gov, which is the site you used.

OK here they are: http://diet-studies.com/splenda.html

Yes, you are correct. I mis-read your post. Looking back I see that you were referring to the widely recognized as safe 'natural, uprocessed' form of stevia. If you can handle the taste of ground stevia leaves or the alcohol extracted tincture, all power to you. Me... I wouldn't feed that stuff to my worst enemy. Stevia extract has some taste issues when compared to sugar, but unprocessed stevia is one of the worst things I've ever consumed. Period.

Well, first of all, let me point out to you, that out of the 12 studies you list

1 has no reference whatsoever to sucralose (Abuse of artificial sweetener as differential diagnosis of lactose intolerance)

2 reveal potential health issues (the first and the last)

9 show sucralose to be safe.

9 studies showing the safety of sucralose! The author of the article disputes these studies and quotes them (out of context, I might add), but who is this mysterious author? Is it Dr. Feingold? Nope, he passed away in '82. The only thing I could find as to the author of these pages was this:

So these studies aren't being challenged by a doctor or a researcher, they're being challenged by a web designer.... hmmmmm....

As far as the 2 studies that do reveal potential health issues with sucralose... The last study (Renal mineralization--a ubiquitous lesion in chronic rat studies) is fully addressed by The Japan Food Chemical Research Foundation:

And lastly... theres the Mutation Research study (The comet assay with 8 mouse organs: results with 39 currently used food additives.)

If you can play the 'excessive dosage' card, I can too. In this study, rats were fed 2000mg per kg body weigh per day. This quantity roughly translates into a typical American's sucralose consumption for 3 years

Here you go!

http://diet-studies.com/splenda.html (read studies 2-10 in their entirety- not out of context)

So Scott do you work for McNeil, have large holdings in them or just use a boat load of Splenda in your cooking?

The FDA denied Splenda's approval based on the data they first submitted and told McNeil to come back when they got it right. After a number of years and who knows how many tests they did come back and did recieve approval for Spenda

As for those studies showing that Spenda is perfectly safe, they do nothing of the sort.

4 of them where comissioned by McNeil Specialty which makes them suspect at best as do you really believe that McNeil would release studies with negitive results?

And the others only show a lack of negitive results, not that the product is perfectly safe, but be my guest. Ingest as much of the stuff as you like, it doesn't bother me one bit.

I use sucralose to bake cakes and muffins every week, with great results. Much of the discussion on this thread centers around sweeteners and covers some of the same ground as the Chef Talk article, "The Sorry Secrets of Sweeteners." If interested, you can find my thoughts on the subject here.

Edited by hlthfd - 8/28/12 at 8:15am

Depending upon the circumstances, I use either granular or Sucralite liquid sucralose. Since the liquid lacks the bulking agents (maltodextrin and dextrose) of the granular product, I prefer to use that when possible. When the additional liquid isn't desirable, granular works fine. For a few cake recipes, the texture suffers a little bit if there isn't any sugar. In those case, I replace just half of the sugar with sucralose. Even frosting can be made using sucralose with great results. Experiment!