Stevia

Please, please try and ditch sugar! It's addictive and it's sooooo unhealthy. I used to have a very sweet tooth but managed to drop it a couple of years ago, so I'm like a reformed addict - evangelical! Feel so much better AND I lost lots of weight.

Beware, Xylitol is extremely poisonous to dogs!
So although it is a natural product from birch trees, it it not advisable to use where there is any risk of harm to animals.
I threw my supply out as soon as I learned this as could not bear the idea of an innocent dog filching a piece of cake and dying as a result.

I have a very sweet tooth but try to use as little sugar as possible. Porridge, when I eat it, which isn't often, we soak overnight with moscatel raisins. I've also tried coconut sugar which I like and I would commit minor crime for pancakes with proper maple syrup and double cream! When all said and done its all sugar but best kept natural and as little as you can. No need to be too abstemious though, unless you have a medical condition which dictates you don't eat it.

I have just put a half teaspoon of Canderel Stevia granulated in my tea and to me it tastes the same as sugar. But have tried the Stevia sweetners - yuk!!

I bought and tried Stevia and found that it left an unpleasant after-taste, and probably easier & nicer to have 'NO' sugar at all in hot drinks. As a few of you have done, I threw it all away ~ what a waste of money as I bought 2 tubs to avoid the internet p&p

Old dogs - new tricks, I suppose.

I'm sticking to sugar. We only have crumble once a week.

The problem with Stevia I have discovered is that some people but not others can taste a bitter taste. This is why it tasted vile to you but not to your husband. Stevia tastes bitter to me.
I always use Xylitol which is another natural sweetener (fron the birch tree). Use it like sugar and find it in good supermarkets and all health food shops

After breast cancer I am on a daily hormone suppression tablet which puts people at risk of osteoporosis. However, when they scanned me, I already had osteoporosis.
They put me on a tablet for that but didn't monitor me [they were meant to do that, but three years down the road nobody had!]. So now the tablet [Twice daily, Calcium and Vitamin D, but mostly sugar - probably to make it taste acceptable] has given me Type 2 diabetes.
I am now fasting 2 days a week - nothing but water - as apparently this can reverse this diabetes [doctor on tv advice!].
I have to say that some vegetables now taste horribly sweet, especially root vegetables such as carrots, parsnips, potatoes...

After breast cancer I am on a daily hormone suppression tablet which puts people at risk of osteoporosis. However, when they scanned me, I already had osteoporosis.
They put me on a tablet for that but didn't monitor me [they were meant to do that, but three years down the road nobody had!]. So now the tablet [Twice daily, Calcium and Vitamin D, but mostly sugar - probably to make it taste acceptable] has given me Type 2 diabetes.
I am now fasting 2 days a week - nothing but water - as apparently this can reverse this diabetes [doctor on tv advice!].
I have to say that some vegetables now taste horribly sweet, especially root vegetables such as carrots, parsnips, potatoes...

After breast cancer I am on a daily hormone suppression tablet which puts people at risk of osteoporosis. However, when they scanned me, I already had osteoporosis.
They put me on a tablet for that but didn't monitor me [they were meant to do that, but three years down the road nobody had!]. So now the tablet [Twice daily, Calcium and Vitamin D, but mostly sugar - probably to make it taste acceptable] has given me Type 2 diabetes.
I am now fasting 2 days a week - nothing but water - as apparently this can reverse this diabetes [doctor on tv advice!].
I have to say that some vegetables now taste horribly sweet, especially root vegetables such as carrots, parsnips, potatoes...

I've not heard of stevia, but nobody on this thread seems to like it. I have used agave syrup, which as the name suggests is a syrup not a powder. It's fine to mix into cake and fruit mixtures and is quite a lot less sweet than golden syrup, so it could take quite a bit of getting used to for some people. I'm always a bit sceptical about the use of the word 'natural' it doesn't mean 'good' although some marketeers would like us to think that it does.

I watched the programme as well. DH uses sweeteners in coffee and thought it might be a good idea to try it, but I get the impression from OPs that it only comes in granular form, not as tablets in a dispenser.

I use Stevia in porridge, custard and rice pudding and don't have a problem with it. I haven't tried baking with it but I expect it could work. It is such a saving of calories as opposed to sugar and I think it tastes OK.

The crumble wasn't exactly ruined - DH didn't notice any difference, but there was a sweetness that wasn't nice. I'm throwing out the rest of the packet. Don't know why I bought it really.

Xylitol is much better, good for baking and cooking too.

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b06wp7jc/trust-me-im-a-doctor-series-4-episode-2
Just watched this again, some of you may find it interesting and alarming!

I have a bad reaction to artificial sweeteners so tried Stevia. No reaction but it tasted awful. I stick to real sugar and just try to eat less of it.

I understood the Trust Me... findings to be that the body reacted to artificial sweeteners making you more susceptible to high blood sugar shysal

The one I use is just Stevia not a mix of ordinary sugar it just looks like natural granulated sugar.

I tried Stevia and found that it left an unpleasant after-taste, so, as a few of you have done, I got rid of it. I think it has been over-hyped.

I've been using Stevia for the last few months just a little on porridge and less than half a spoon in my coffee , also replaced brown sugar in crumbles and never noticed any difference, I thought it would 'taste' in the coffee but not it just tastes like sugar. I saw that piece on Trust Me too so I shall continue with it.

I'm not keen on Stevie and find that Zylitol, which is made from birch tree sap, tastes much better although not cheap. You use like for like.
Always best to cut sweetening down to the minimum that you can tolerate anyway. A good idea to add a little and taste since you can always add it but can't remove it. In baking it is easy to cut the sugar content down by a third without compromising on the taste and funnily enough the less you use habitually the sweeter things taste. Even vegetables have a real sweetness to them when your diet isn't overloaded with sugar or sweetening.
Haven't used sweetening in any drink except cocoa since I was about 7 years old.

I have Stevia on my shopping list for tomorrow after watching Trust Me I'm a Doctor last week. I can't quite remember what their findings were, but I think they said that saccharine and other artificial sweeteners raise the blood sugar level as much as sugar does, but Stevia, being natural, doesn't.
I often use the granular sweetener for stewed fruit and cereal, and it tastes fine to me as I am used to it.

Sorry posted twice sticky fingers

I have also tried Tate & Lyle with stevia it was awful chucked it