Erythritol – A bitter side of alt sweeteners?

The Cleveland Clinic finds link between “natural, low-carb” sweetener and health conditions

Here we go again…(Insert rant from a Nutritionist trying to convince people to eat real food when they just don’t want to). From low fat frankenstein foods, to no sugar processed foods, we just never seem to learn. We can have our cake and eat it too, can it just be made real, whole food ingredients please? Can we stop trying to “cheat” the system to get more snacks and sweets in our diet, for less calories? It is not whole food, nourishing ingredients that make people unhealthy and obese, it is the overly processed, fake foods and we need to wake up to the harm and deception these processed foods are having on us.

The cycle of trendy/novel ingredients that allow us to have our treats, until we find out said novel ingredient is perhaps giving us more than we bargained for, continues to happen, just insert new ingredients, or new marketing claims to suit the diets of the day. Not much has changed since diet foods initially were introduced post war.

I digress. What ingredient am I talking about today? Erythritol. This has become a commonly used sweetener alternative with the rise of low sugar and the keto diet specifically. Erythritol is a sugar alcohol used in low carb and low/no sugar sweets and has a cooling effect as an after effect. It has 70% the sweetness of sugar but, is lower sugar and lower carb. It can be used fairly easily as a substitute in recipes without throwing off ratios and final results too much. Think keto cookies, or cakes, or anything really with this ingredient.

What is it? It is typically made from fermented corn, and since your body can’t properly digest it, that is how it creates a negligible effect on blood sugar which is why it is considered low carb as it just “passes through” and is excreted mostly through urine. It can cause nausea, diarrhea/digestive upset when consumed in higher amounts for many people. Last I checked, a bit of dates and maple syrup did not cause me to crap my pants ;p

Digestive upset not bad enough for you? Well, it turns out that it may be even worse than we thought and that there may be some implications long term in trying to cheat our way into being able to eat all the sweets we desire, sweetened with processed alternatives like erythritol.

So, what is all the fuss recently in the press about this ingredient? Well, it turns out, quite a serious health implication that we should take note of. Researchers at the Cleveland Clinic found that consumption of erythritol has led to an increased risk of heart attack, stroke and even death. This conclusion came out of a study involving 4000 people in the USA and Europe that showed those with elevated erythritol in their blood, were at elevated risks for blood clots, which could lead to cardiac arrest and strokes.

In the study, results showed that even after the consumption of a beverage sweetened with erythritol, erythritol levels in the blood stayed elevated for days at levels observed to increase clotting risks.

I’m all for lower sugar in our food supply but, not through continuing to do the same thing, which is find/develop ultra processed ingredients that are not at all “natural” and that we have no longterm studies on their impact to human health. Nature already has everything that we need and more! We don’t need more processed ingredients from corn that are used in ultra processed foods, with no nutritional value, that take away from our health and the health of the planet.

My hope is that we can turn to using real food and common sense that we know will provide nourishment, satisfy cravings and won’t take a toll on our health. Keep it simple, tread carefully and if it sounds too good to be true, it likely is.

Cited study: https://newsroom.clevelandclinic.org/2023/02/27/cleveland-clinic-study-finds-common-artificial-sweetener-linked-to-higher-rates-of-heart-attack-and-stroke/