A Spoonful of Sweetener

Most classes on the first day don’t do much more than simply skim over the syllabus and set ground rules about attendance. 

But my first class of the year, biology of food, jumped right in with a discussion on what text is on a pack of Splenda and what of that text is true.

A variety of things were mentioned, from the distribution center to the net weight per packet. 

And, of course, we discussed the ingredients, which led to the largest part of our class lecture and discussion.

A Splenda packet gives the legal required amount of nutritional value information on the back, as well as the ingredients.

Only three ingredients are listed as being part of the assumed patented recipe — dextrose, maltodextrin and sucralose.

It’s simple; it’s carbohydrates and sugars. It’s just that the molecules are rearranged in order to be ingested by diabetics without making them ill.

It’s something like this — real sugar is used to make all artificial sweeteners.

The scientists and creators of all our favorite fake sugars play around with the glucose molecules so that they cannot be digested as sugar.

Dextrose and maltodextrin are just glucose molecules that have been rearranged, while sucralose is glucose with chlorine molecules added.

Yum, I love chlorine in my sweet tea and baked goods.

So if we are using real sugar to create fake sugar, why is it supposed to be safe for
diabetics?

Well, by changing the molecular structure of glucose, the human body cannot digest it. 

The pancreas provides insulin to break down glucose, but it cannot digest any changed forms of it. 

So the real sugar is used to add the flavor, but is not supposed to actually have any impact on the body.

Because it cannot be broken down and digested in the body, you cannot gain calories from eating any artificial sweetener.

This is why the companies are able to claim that their product is a no-calorie
sweetener.

There’s just one little catch. Since the companies are producing their sweeteners in large quantities, it’s really difficult to insure that every bit of glucose is transformed into another molecule.

Essentially, it is near impossible to make it sugar free.

However, because the serving size is so small, and since the Food and Drug Administration can’t really test these products on everyone, legally each company is allowed to state that their sweetener is a suitable replacement for sugar.

But if you take more than the recommended serving size, you’re still possibly ingesting a large enough quantity of sugar that could make a diabetic ill.

This is just in an artificial sweetener that we are seeing these issues.

Only three ingredients are listed for Splenda. Just imagine all of the molecular modifications added to junk foods, like the Twinkie.

I’m not really sure why this bothers me so much to begin with. I’m not a diabetic, nor do I drink or eat hardly any artificial sweeteners. I should have hardly anything to worry about, right?

I guess my main concern for myself, as well as you, is making sure the large food corporations in charge of modifying food for our convenience have all of their sciences down for every single little molecule.

It’s just something to think about the next time you think your diet coke tastes like chlorine.