Maggie! That is very exciting!!!

I know my doc had my taking SteviaPlus as a supplement when I first started on this woe to help stabilize my bgs.

Very

Blessings!
Sharron
Author of "Low Carb Cooking at Sharron's Place," and "Extreme Lo-Carb Cuisine," available where ever books are sold.

www.thelowcarbcook.com

"My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart." Colossians 2:2

WOW Maggie what awesome results!!!! I've been using stevia for YEARS, but even more so now. I'm thrilled to see these results. I use it almost exclusively, supplementing it with splenda. I like mixing the two, it gives things a nice, well rounded sweet taste. I like the fact that it retains its sweetness even when heated too. WOOOHOOO for Stevia!!!!

There's been buzz on Dom's "message boards" (ugh) about Stevia's price skyrocketing. What a load of crap. How is the government manipulating THAT one? Makes me want to spit.

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development

Atkins-3/14/03
174/143.6/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

BTW, I am fearful that the government is going to get its fingers heavily into herbal supplements and make them near impossible to get someday. The pharmaceutical and food companies have soooooooooo much power, it's scary.

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development

Atkins-3/14/03
174/143.6/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

Barb do you mind telling me how much of the Stevia and Splenda you mix together say for a kefir shake or anything else you may use it in ...since I only bought my box a week or so ago, I've not used it much and now I think I'll give it a shot...just don't know how to mix it.. I may test it in the morning to see what it does to my bs..if anyone knows how much to use to test with ,let me know...
thanks a bunch

Sandy,kefir lover now
TYPE 2 DIABETIC

Sandy, I generally use 1/8 tsp of Stevia (pure) and 1-2 TBS. of splenda sweetened syrups. When I use packets of Splenda I use 1-2. It's a relative thing and depeneds on how sweet you like stuff. I really like mine sweet. So that would make it VERY sweet.

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development

Atkins-3/14/03
174/143.6/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

My smoothie recipe is in my signature link

Blessings!
Sharron
Author of "Low Carb Cooking at Sharron's Place," and "Extreme Lo-Carb Cuisine," available where ever books are sold.

www.thelowcarbcook.com

"My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart." Colossians 2:2

Ok all,
I found got ahold of some maltitol and finally got up the nerve to test it. Given it's laxative tendencies I was a bit scared but then I figured "what the heck". Needless to say I'm not going anywhere today.


MALTITOL
7:00AM - 84 - took 4TBS
7:30AM - 108
8:00AM - 112
9:00AM - 110

For me that was quite a jump as compared to the following erythritol results done earlier:

ERYTHRITOL
7:00AM - 84
7:30AM - 91
8:00AM - 92
9:00AM - 86

Lets just say I won't be needing any fiber today

Rave
232/166/130
57yo. 5'2"
Started Atkins 6/1/02

wow Rave...that was BRAVE. Kudos to you and hope it's 'smooth sailing' in the GI department.

"Do, or do not. There is no 'try'." - Yoda ('The Empire Strikes Back')
Start Atkins 9.1.03
225/198/130ish
My Birthday Goal: Size 14

Yes, I was thinking the same thing, BRAVE RAVE!!! Thanks for doing that!!!

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development

Atkins-3/14/03
174/143.6/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

Wow! Thanks Rave!

All in all, however, (laxative possiblities aside) that maltitol didn't hit you very badly at all! My results were more like up almost 60 pts in the first 30 minutes and the rise was sustained for about an hour, followed by a crash. About the same way sugar would act on me.

... oh yeah, and no laxative effect.

There's a definite YMMV factor here and it might just be that "do you or do you not have the enzyme to use it" theory that someone proposed a while back. If that's so, I got the enzyme, LOL!

Maggie
5'1" ~~ Atkins since '98 (160 + lbs)
~ 50 lbs. of "water" gone forever! ~

~~Redhead until further notice! ~~

All I'll say is the laxative effects lasted til mid afternoon.

However, more interesting to me was how I felt over all. During the BGL rise, even though not so dramatic as to make me worry, I was really feeling it, sort of a cross between a hot flash and too much caffein. From about noon on I just didn't feel good. Hard to explain but definitely not "in the zone" as our zoners would say. I felt none of that with eyrthritol.

So why are manufacturers so dead set on using maltitol??? Is it just dollars?

Rave
232/166/130
57yo. 5'2"
Started Atkins 6/1/02

man, rave, that took some cahones. I think they use malitol so much because it tastes good. Malitol works well in the SF chocolate, and since taste is what many people are concerned with they dont care about or think about possible side effects. I work at Trader JOes and often warn people about eating too much of the sugar free chocolate. most just assume its okay because it tastes good, only to feel the price later.

OK, and speaking of chocolate... I heard that Hershey's had dumped their dreadful lactitol sweetened line and come out with a new chocolate bar sweetened with (...drumroll...) Erythritol & sucralose!

This was important to me since, in the olden days, Hershey's milk chocolate was the standard by which I judged all others. When Hershey's first came out with a sugar free chocolate bar, made with that lactitol, I was excited - until I tasted one. Gag! I never even tested one since there was no chance I'd ever want to put one into my mouth again for any reason.

In the "new, improved" version, the bars are larger than the lactitol version, not huge, but the general size of sf chocolate bars. 1.1 oz. The front of the label announced "1 Gram Sugar." The ingredients are: Erythritol, inulin (a fiber), chocolate, cocoa butter, polyglycitol syrup (don't know what this is but suspect it - along with the cream - might be the source of the 1 gm of carbs they say are from actual sugar), cream, soy lecithin, artificial flavor and sucralose.

According to the nutrition information, a serving size is 1 bar and each contains 18 gms of carbs with 7 gms of fiber, for a net carb count of 11, 10 of which are erythritol. I'm pleased that Hershey has put a big notice <span class="ev_code_RED">in red</span> next to the nutrition information about sugar alcohols, saying that they " generally have little impact on blood sugar." I think that's better than no discussion at all which many products do, or the blanket "you can deduct sugar alcohols because they have little to no impact on blood sugar" which (for many people and many sugar alcohols) is simply a lie and/or they have a notable impact on colonic function, as our brave tester have shown.

Well, are they any good? Bet yer bippie, or I wouldn't have bothered to spend all this time telling you about it. Is it exactly like a real hershey bar? No, but it's darned close. It's a little less "milky" if you know what I mean. It's looks and mouth-feel are a bit more like a dark chocolate than a milk chocolate, but it is a fully sweet chocolate. It is similar to an endulge bar which I think are very good, but full of the (one way or another, LOL!) deadly maltitol.

Ok, now for the test results:
9:15 92 (about 2.25 hrs. post bacon and egg breakfast) Ate a whole bar. (Yum)
9:45 92 (Woo-HOO!)
10:15 97
10:45 98
11:15 96

I like it, but not so much that I have a desire to be hiding bars in purses, dresser drawers and file cabinets at work (as I was known to do in the distant past. ) I have so many things that I enjoy eating which aren't even a stretch, and it's been so long since I was a complete chocoholic, I just don't have a "void" that needs filling anymore. Nevertheless, I'll probably use them chopped up for the chocolate bits in various of my lc "special occassion" desserts: like the canoli cream frosting for my sponge cake, chocolate chip ice cream and even in cookies. I can do this knowing that the chocolate tastes delicious and it won't add a lot to my blood sugar reaction in a given recipe.

Color me happy!

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Hey Maggie! Thank you! Thank you!

That is good info. I wonder if there is any way to let Hershey know we APPROVE!!!

This is all I could find on their web site (no email link):

Consumer Relations
Call toll-free: 1-800-468-1714
Weekdays 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM EST

They don't make it terribly convenient, but browsing around there, I think it's sort of important to call. This new product isn't even ON their web site! They're still touting the horrible "sugar free" lacitol based version there.

I'll call tomorrow. If anyone else calls, let's try to help them understand that they have one product that sucks (for various reasons, including it tastes terrible, raises blood sugar and many reports of "ex-lax"-like side effects) and another product that's totally better than the competition, including their own dismal "sugar free" version.

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