Xylitol is an increasingly popular sweetener. Do you know the advantages and disadvantages of using it? Read the article and see if it's worth to introduce xylitol into your daily diet. Many because of obsessive advertising begin to abandon the usual sugar in favor of newfangled substitutes, but is it worth doing?.

Xylitol as a substitute for sugar.

The popularity of xylitol, a sweetener extracted from birch bark, is growing. Its availability in stores is constant, so many people are interested in the properties of xylitol.

Properties of xylitol.

Chemically, xylitol refers to so-called sugar alcohols, in other words, called polyols. This group of compounds also includes: sorbitol, mannitol and erythritol. Xylitol was previously obtained from birch bark, so it is also called birch sugars. Currently, xylitol is mainly derived from corn.

Birch sugar has long been used as a food additive, designated by the symbol E967. You will find it, among others, in chewing gums or sweets, where it acts as a sweetener.

Xylitol has the shape of white crystals and is similar to white sugar. Some say that birch sugar leaves a subtle sense of coolness in the language, but most people can not distinguish between the two substances. For people who care for a healthy diet, the most important are the properties and calorific value of xylitol.

Xylitol, although it has the same level of sweetness for sugar, however, provides far fewer calories. Birch sugar has:.

2.4 kcal in 1 g, and sucrose - 4 kcal in 1 g.

The calorific value of xylitol, therefore, is 40% lower. What does this mean in practice?.

1 tsp xylitol = 12 kcal.

1 teaspoon white sugar = 20 kcal.

If during the day you drink 3 teas and each instead of regular sugar, you sweeten with a spoonful of its xylitol, you will consume 24 kilocalories less. Remember that several small changes in the diet have the effect of reducing the energy value of the entire diet.

Xylitol is a sweetener that is resistant to high temperatures, so it can be used as a substitute for sugar in sweet pastries. The exception is yeast dough, yeast does not grow on birch sugar.

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