Sugar Substitutes - How safe are they?

Dear all,

Can anybody tell me about the details of sugar substitutes available in market? How safe and popularare they? Are any of them on the side lines due to some reason or the other? What are the criteria
for making any sugar substitute more popular than the others?


Best regards,

A Sankara Narayanan

Hi Sankara, Take a look at the web page below and download the PDF at the bottom of the page - see section 2 for revised guidance reflecting amendments to the principal Regulations by the Sweeteners in Food (Amendment) Regulations 1996, 1997, 1999 and 2001.

Food Additives Legislation Guidance Notes

Also have a look at this US article:

US Sugar Substitutes

Personally I don't use sugar substitutes, but I'll have a look next time I'm in the supermarket to see what is available.

Cheers,
Simon

Dear Simon,

Both links made interesting reading. Even though the second one about US sugar substitutes dated back to 2004, from there I could get a link to Artificial sweeteners. Thanks a lot.

As I have discussed in the forum before, our company being a manufacturer of natural sweetener I just wanted to explore the possibilities of perhaps coming out with a formulation which includes the natural sweetener thaumatin along with sucralose, aspartame etc. Its just a food for thought. Another interesting sweetener which I could find while exploring the net was stevia.


Best regards,

A Sankara Narayanan

Dear Sankara,
I read about thaumatin as a natural sweetener (Protien sweetener),
for Stevia, I had a long time with it because of M.Sc. on "Nutrition with Stevioside" and my PhD  on the new trends of extraction of Stevioside from stevia using the
 DIC tech. in La Rochelle Univ. France
the situation here in EGYPT, we succeded to plant stevia. also, we have trials of extraction.
also, we export the stevioside and sell it with fillers in the Egyptian market.

Dear Mohamed,

Sorry for the late reply. With your expertise, can you advise me to go for a formulation of table top sweetener with natural sweeteners alone(like thaumatin, stevia etc..) ? With a good promo.. it will stand apart I hope. I am looking for expert advise for formulating my product as a table top sweetener. I may even think of tying up with a market leader for marketing it.

Best Regards,

A Sankara Narayanan