All Natural Liquid Sweeteners

Sugar is irreplaceable for a lot of things like baking and coating our cinnamon buns. But for me when it comes to coffee and tea…sugar just doesn’t cut it…it doesn’t sweeten to the right intensity without heaping teaspoons one after the other. That’s where packets of Equal and Splenda have kept me going. But I’ve always wondered if there were more natural alternatives out there that may be healthier and dissolve just as effectively.

Thankfully, Nevella recently offered me the opportunity to sample 2 of their latest To Go sweeteners powered by fruits and leaves that don’t have as wide a reach as sugar:

Stevia

The best thing about Nevella’s Stevia is that it’s the first and only truly portable liquid zero calorie and carbohydrate sweetener. Stevia is a plant that grows mainly in the plains of South America. For hundreds of years, regional Indian tribes used it as a digestive aid and topically applied it for healing wounds. Rebiana is the compound what makes it sweet…200-300 times that of sugar. It’s extracted by steeping the stevia leaves in the same way you would make a cup of tea.

Monk Fruit

Known as luo han guo in China and la hán quá in Vietnam, Monk Fruit is a type of small melon which grows exclusively in tropical and subtropical regions of Southeast Asia. Used for nearly 800 years starting with Buddhist monks in southern China as an all natural sweetener, Monk Fruit contains mogrosides, a naturally occurring zero calorie sweetener.

Natural processing separates and concentrates monk fruit’s sweet components by the following 3-step process:

• Crushing: Fresh monk fruit is crushed, releasing natural juices.
• Infusing: Crushed monk fruit is infused with water to release its sweet components.
• Concentration: The monk fruit infusion is refined, concentrating the sweet components into a fruit extract.

Photo courtesy of Steve Mirsky