Eating zero calorie foods makes you lose weight. Fact or fiction? Fiction, pure fiction! Fact is, natural zero calorie food is good. Reality is that most of us tend to use artificial sweeteners that give us the taste of sweetness while carrying none of the calories that sugar and sweet things do. Yet, in America, the world’s largest consumer of artificial sweeteners, obesity continues to be a national problem despite the fact that the consumption of artificial sweeteners has jumped from less than 70 million in 1987 to more than 160 million in 2000. How so?
The culprit, apparently, is the artificial sweetener.
Researchers explain this like this: Sugar substitutes may “fool” the body calorie-wise, but they cannot deceive the body’s insulin response. Though they are short on calories they can, nevertheless, cause an excess release of insulin and the cravings and weight gain that usually follow. The rule of thumb is this:
- If it tastes sweet, your body thinks it is getting sugar.
- If your body thinks that it is getting sugar, your body releases insulin.
- If you are prone to releasing too much insulin, then anything that tastes sweet, no matter how low calorie it is, can lead to increased cravings and weight gain.
Dr. Richard F. Heller and Dr. Rachael F. Heller who conducted a research on the insulin response towards sugar-free foods further added that, “Even if you are somehow able to successfully and repeatedly fight off your carbohydrate cravings, we have found that frequent intake of sugar substitutes may put your body in a fat-making mode, making it easier to gain and more difficult to lose weight.”
The other culprit is also the food processing industry which while using the so-called zero calorie products, is also adding to the salt and fat content in the food they are packaging. Their idea for doing this is to maintain the taste that could be compromised while stripping the food of its caloric content. What you get to eat, just as you’re thinking that you’ve cheated your way into this meal, is fatter and a body geared to consume more.
The answer to this dilemma is NATURAL sweeteners. And yes, there are natural food sweeteners that have no calories as well. But if one must use such sweeteners, our preference would be sucralose
(Splenda®), the only sweetener made from sugar. Sucralose is safe, non-caloric and does not raise blood sugar. It has been used in Canada for years, and the FDA recently approved it after reviewing more than one hundred studies conducted over the past 20 years. Natural sweeteners ending in the suffix “-ose,” such as maltose, fructose, etc., should be avoided. However, certain sugar alcohols such as maltitol do not affect blood sugar and are acceptable. This does not mean that you give up your diet cola and start drinking regular sugary colas, or start sinking your teeth into mithais.
The idea is to know that when you drink a diet soft drink, what you may have done is trick the body into thinking that other sweet items too do not have as many calories either. Choose your substitutes right and be aware of what you are eating.
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