HOW CUTTING DOWN REFINED SUGAR CAN GREATLY IMPROVE YOUR HEALTH!

Last year I blogged about how I had made a conscious effort to significantly reduce the quantity of sugar my family was having in our overall diet. It's now been 12 months since we made that big change of cutting down the sugar intake in our diet! I'm so happy to report that not only have my four boys behaviour, concentration and hyperactivity levels have improved but I've lost even more weight in this time. My skin is much clearer than it was, my head less fuzzy and I suffer far less of that mid afternoon slump that I used to experience. I have the energy to power on all through the day without the highs and lows of sugar addiction running through my body!

Sugar really was my drug of choice! My body would tell me when it thought it needed it (3pm slump anyone) and my family and I were eating sugar in almost every item that entered my mouths. It would start with in the morning with breakfast cereal. A label of low sugar on a cereal packet still means sugar is in it. I was having sugar in my low fat choccy milk, sugar in my coffee, sugar in sauces, sugar added to some juices, sugar in muesli bars, sugar in chocolate, sugar in soft drinks, sugar in my dips, even sugar in the bread we were buying! No matter where you look you will find sugar in processed foods, even in things you weren't expecting! This is even more true for most low fat processed foods. They lower the fat content in a product but they put more sugar, salt or flavour enhancers in to give you the flavour boost you would find in the high fat products (cheese and plain milk are among the few products that this doesn't relate to).

Best solution to cutting down sugar (let's face it, cutting it out completely is near impossible) is to eat as many homemade foods as your time will allow. I found the easiest way to the cut the time factor down and make a multitude of things from scratch was using my Thermomix. Go google it is you've never heard about it. You certainly won't run out of things to read about this incredible machine! If finances won't stretch far enough to purchase a TM (don't forget their payment plans) then you can choose to use standard food processor (FP) to make most of my recipes. You may have more washing up to do swapping between your FP and other cooking devices, it may take slightly longer to prepare the dish or you may need to buy certain items in their milled or ground forms (eg: buying almond meal instead of making your own), you may need to replace your FP or blender more frequently than I would my TM but in the end you can still use your cheaper machines to replicate my healthy eating ideas and recipes listed on my Blog and Facebook page (also listed under 'Angies Healthy Kitchen).

There are many refined sugar alternatives but I'll just briefly explain the ones I regularly use in my kitchen.

I'm a big fan of Coconut Sugar. It is a 'sugar' produced from the sap of cut flower buds of the coconut palm so can sometimes be called Coconut palm sugar as well. It's been used for thousand of years in the South East Asian regions, particularly in Indonesia and the Philippines. Here are a few of the reasons I love using it:

• It has a beautiful caramel flavoured taste and gives a rich, smooth flavour. I use it for making my healthy style Hot chocolate drinks, for making custard for my boys (tastes like caramel yogo snack, but healthy), in baking or sometimes when cooking an asian inspired meal.
• It has a low GI (glycemic index) of 35 (Honey has a GI of 35-58 whilst sugar has a GI of 60).
•  It has a high mineral count, a rich source of potassium, magnesium, zinc and iron. It also contains Vitamin B1, B2, B3 and B6. When compared to brown sugar, coconut sugar has 36 times the iron, four times the magnesium, and over 10 times the amount of zinc.
• Use it anywhere you would use brown sugar or when you want a rich flavour. You don't need a lot of this to pack a punch!

Another of my favourite natural sweeteners is Agave Syrup (sometimes called Agave nectar). Agave syrup is produced from the nectar of a mexican cactus. This stuff seriously tastes awesome and whilst it is a fructose sweetener it's still a great alternative to refined sugar. One of the best reasons I love using Agave syrup is because it is so sweet you really don't need a hell of a lot of it. Here are some other reasons you should try using it:

• Agave syrup has a low GI (glycemic index) of between 10 and 19, significantly lower than other sweeteners. Honey has a GI of 35-58 whilst sugar has a GI of 60.
• Low GI carbohydrates, such as agave syrup, can prevent your blood-sugar levels from rising too high, which can lead to high triglycerides and an increased risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and heart problems.
• Agave syrup has a consistency similar to honey yet it is not quite as viscous (sticky) so it is easily dissolved into things such as baked goods and yoghurt.

My other favourite natural sweetener is Pure organic maple syrup. Maple syrup comes from the sap of the Maple tree, grown in abundance throughout Canada.

• It contains significant amounts of zinc and manganese, as well as amino acids.
• Compared to honey it has 15 times more calcium and 1/10 as much sodium. I also find like agave it is considerably sweeter than sugar and full in flavour that you often need less than you would normally would need using sugar.
• Maple is great with yoghurt, on cereal (not that I eat those anymore), in hot or cold drinks you make at home and of course on pancakes!

Raw honey is a great alternative for spreads, in smoothies or baking. I don't tend to use a lot of it as it can be quite sticky to work with and it doesn't dissolve as nicely into things as agave does. It has plenty of nutritional and medicinal advantages over refined sugar though so worth looking into if you want to make some changes in that respect.

Another alternative worth considering is Stevia. Stevia is also a natural sweetener but it is made from the leaf of the stevia plant. It is considered to be approx 300 times sweeter than sugar so very little is required. Stevia contains no calories and therefore has no effect on blood sugar levels, making it suitable for diabetics. I find that Stevia has quite a bitter aftertaste. It is for this reason I use only a small amount of Stevia to help reduce my overall sweetener content. I know of some people who can purely replace all their sweetened products with stevia but unfortunately the aftertaste means I am unable to do so. Still don't discount using this product in addition to other sweeteners to lower their total content and therefore reduce your overall caloric intake.

My recipes that you can find on my blog and Facebook page (by the same name) will often list agave syrup, maple syrup or coconut sugar as my sweetener. Feel free to use honey instead (or sugar if really necessary) but keep in mind the reason I avoid sugar as much as possible is because it is easy to eat too much of it collectively over the course of a day and can be quite addictive in the long term! I steer clear of artificial sweeteners altogether as I don't believe anything that has such a long chemical-based chain of ingredients can be a good thing. There seems to be more research to be done into the area of artificial sweeteners and there are already many countries who have banned their use. Everyone has their own theory on health matters, what you read here on my blog are my own. You ultimately choose the way in which to live your life!