Pushing the boundaries in search of the perfect, healthy sweetness
Thanks to our expert team involved in every step of the growing process, SWT Stevia are finding new ways to extract the maximum from every plant, while conserving our trademark 100% natural water-based processing system.
The sun sets in Laurinburg, NC. Hal has analysed the different stevia leaves which are ripening in his crop and he drives home with a sweet taste in his mouth. It’s September and his plants are still accumulating the sweetness gathered from the sun, without showing any sign of flowering. Delaying flowering is key to achieve a high accumulation of glycosides, and therefore granting sweet, delicious stevia leaves. When he thinks of ripening, he thinks of the natural process his leaves follow to achieve a perfect sweetness, out of enzymatic or biotechnology processes. That is the way stevia was meant to be.
Learning to get the maximum power out of every single leaf helps to make SWT Stevia the natural choice for healthy, sustainable sweetness. In order to make sure that we deliver the flavour you expect, coupled with the consistency and sustainability that set us apart from the competition, our teams of bio-scientists are constantly working to ensure that we find new ways to make the most of this incredible plant.
The stevia plant is a complex one. Producing stevia is a long and specialised process, requiring years of expert knowledge and understanding. Steviol glycosides are the natural compounds that give the stevia leaf its unique and exceptional tastes. These form the building blocks for our delicious SWT flavour and can be up to 300 times sweeter than cane sugar and other traditional non intense sweeteners. Considering the intensity of the sweetness provided by stevia plant sweeteners, and how our body specifically breaks up their molecules before excreting them, it is completely safe for diabetics and those pursuing a low sugar diet.
It is these compounds which we are looking to maximise in order to be able to ensure that every bite tastes better than ever and helps everyone who enjoys our stevia to live their best possible lives by eliminating unhealthy foods forever.
When the Stevia plant flowers - a natural part of the cultivation process, the number of glycosides reduces significantly. This makes the plant taste less sweet as a result and to stop accumulating glycosides. The flowering process has required us understand with precision which genetic mechanisms and environmental trigger this unique process of plants. By understanding deeply this phenomena, we have focused our research in order to delay as much as possible this process and allow stevia plants to accumulate as much glycosides as possible, all whilst ensuring that the essential trace elements that stevia can help to deliver remain absolutely intact.
Our team at SWT is working to ensure that this flowering delay of the plant does not result in an inferior product for our customers, by employing cutting-edge plant selection techniques. Grafting plants and experimenting with different types of flower means that SWT stevia will always deliver high-quality and natural healthy sweetness, as well as lead research into hardier, more winter-resistant species of Stevia that can drive the sweetness revolution forward.
By understanding and grafting these plants, aging from only 10 days right up to 30, we are able to unlock the secrets of improved sweetness, which we can pass on to our partners through our natural refinery processes. The results of these examinations are analysed in our on-site laboratories using the plants themselves, and all our findings are used to improve our crops, to deliver better-than-ever products that provided sugar-free nutrition and nourishment.
In the fight for a healthy lifestyle, and in combatting obesity, diabetes and poor health in general, SWT are helping to create a plant for all seasons, which will deliver the very best in flavour while refusing to compromise on our 100% natural water-based refinery processes and maintain our commitment to zero-GMO usage in our stevia products.
SWT Stevia brings the healthy sweetness revolution to the UK
With the commencement of operations in our incredible, brand-new UK headquarters, SWT Stevia introduces a new market to the delicious taste of stevia and takes a huge leap towards transforming the health of the nation.
SWT Stevia are thrilled to announce our entry into the UK market with Burnley-based SWT UK labs. SWT is working with local colleges, universities and suppliers to ensure that not only does fantastic, healthy sweetness cross the Atlantic to the United Kingdom, but that SWT are at the forefront of research into a better, more delicious future.
Access to the world-class scientific experience and facilities in the UK, coupled with our 100% natural, non-GMO stevia grown in South America is the perfect recipe for a new, ground-breaking type of healthy sweetness. With carbon footprints and sustainability becoming an ever more serious goal for businesses, the creation of amazing UK-created sugar substitutes has the potential to make a lasting difference to the food production landscape across the country.
Having created strong links with local facilities, SWT offers tangible changes to consumers across the country. As a company that is motivated by improving nutrition and providing health sweetness, the chance to meet Public Health England’s target of a 20% sugar reduction is an amazing opportunity.
While Stevia based solutions have become progressively known in the UK, the opportunity to demonstrate its ability to transform nutritionwith an excellent taste, and to change lives is an incredibly exciting one. From school dinners to haute cuisine to bakery and beverages, there are a world of opportunities for the Great British people to discover. The conversation is moving not only towards how to make our food better, but how to make it more sustainable, and we believe that SWT offers the perfect solution to these questions.
We see SWT UK beyond what a sweetness supplier delivers. In an environment where small steps can make a big different, our interest in empowering the local community to succeed through a combination of fantastic, healthy sweetness and solid investment in an area with enormous potential provides everyone involved with the opportunity to thrive as part of a healthier future.
The building blocks of healthy sweetness
Most effort in sweetness characterization has focused on a few trending terms when describing an alternative sweeetener, such as “just like sugar”, or “a thousand time sweeter than sugar” or “no aftertaste”. These are all valid terms, but not precise or meaningful enough. We all agree that sweetness is a hedonic experience and should stay like that. As similar to sugar as possible. But, what is the meaning of being similar to sugar, defined as sucrose. It may mean many different things. Let’s focus on those related to the volume, structural role of sugar in foods, and what happens when we aim to replace them by alternative compounds:
Typical sugar replacements, in terms of bulking are:
- Other sugars: Here we are excluding confusion induction synonymous expressions of sucrose, like coconut sugar, dates, apple juice or honey, as ultimately these are slightly unpurified versions of sucrose. Let’s think of Fructose, which is 20% to 40% sweeter than sugar (depending on temperature and pH). While sweeter than sugar, fructose loses its crystallinity even at room temperature in humid conditions, as a result of what is called the glass transition temperature, which is characteristic of each compound (Correia et al, 2009). It actually becomes amorphous at much lower temperatures and moistures than sucrose, or glucose, which makes it difficult to manage it industrially. Therefore, it becomes chewy, sticky and is quite difficult to use and preserve, both as an ingredient, but also in final products.
- Polyols: Most of them are synthetic, enzymatically produced or fermented. A couple of notable exemptions are naturally occurring or spontaneously fermented (in NON GMO microorganisms). This is the case of Erythritol and Xylitol. While these compounds have an ugly name, they have several interesting properties from a functional, metabolic and health point of view (Wölnerhanssen et al, 2020), including solubility, hygroscopicity, anti-diabetic, intestine absorption and a lack of Maillard reaction occurrence.
- Fibers: Fibers are non-digestible carbohydrates fermented in our large intestine, as a definition. They can rather be soluble or insoluble. However, just as our digestive system is not able to digest them, they are digested by our microflora, which has turned to be far more relevant that what we imagined in our immunology, behavior and homeostasis, just to name a few aspects. They are so relevant, that even breast milk includes fibers and prebiotic compounds (Human Milk Oligosaccharides) (Plaza et al, 2018), which are not digested by us, but by the microorganisms in our guts. How something can be so important that even the first food we have as human beings includes it?. Our mothers feed their first meal to us and our microorganisms at the same time. Let`s get back to fibers, some of them are soluble, others insoluble. Industrially, most soluble fibers are obtained from Chicory, Agave or synthesized from Fructose and Dextrose. Insoluble fibers are diverse as nature, and can be byproducts from lemon zest and many other crops, providing outstanding rheological (texture related) properties to drinks and foods.
So, which physical and functional properties should we look at when replacing sugar or sucrose?
- Sugar is a crystalline compound: At room temperature and moisture, sugar behaves as a crystalline compound. This means that it gets sticky only when it gets humid and it provides the perfect structure giving gloss to cakes, tarts, sweets and famous desserts such as creme brûlée, or the shining crystals above a donut. This crystalline condition is enormously relevant also to allow a good chocolate to have what we call “ a good snap”. So, when we replace sugar, we need to think of those compounds that can provide a good crystalline condition under storage and consumption conditions. Inulin fiber will never provide that crystalline condition, so characteristic of sugar replacements should take into consideration this aspect. Polyols, for example, are crystalline compounds under similar conditions to sugar so they perform very well when replacing solid structures of sugar.
- Dancing with solubility is an art: Ice creams stay soft depending on the temperature at which a saturated system of sugars and milk solids crystallize. Gummy bears are transparent because at the concentration where these compounds become perfectly chewy, sucrose is in a concentration where it does not become a crystal. Erythritol will crystallize in that same condition (as a result of a much lower solubility than sugar), Xylitol will perform quite effectively as sugar, and inulin or fibers, while soluble, will not provide the right combination of viscosity and chewiness needed.
- The power of heat: Whenever we think of pound cakes, cupcakes or baked doughs, the browning of the dough in the oven is a key element in terms of flavor development of the dough, as well as in the aspect of it. Technically, this is what we call Maillard browning reaction, and is the results of a reaction between sugars and amino acids. This reaction provides color, taste but also is relevant because of the formation of non -desired compounds, such as acrylamides. Some sucrose replacements, like erythritol, have a neglect able Maillard browning reactions with amino acids. Others, such as Tagatose, Allulose or Isomalt have huge Maillard reaction rates. This may be desirable in specific deserts, like Creme Brûlée, but may turn baking into a difficult operation, as dough development and cooking may happen long after the product looks, tastes and feels totally burnt. Combined systems may be a good solution for this, as well as understanding the specific content of amino-acids and reducing sugars in foods.
And what about the health impact of these bulking, structuring sucrose replacement compounds?
Every voluminous food, i.e, that is not digested, needs eventually to be excreted. Here is where all of these compounds differ substantially.
Partially metabolized: Compounds like Tagatose and Maltitol are partially digested. During this process, while Maltitol is partially metabolized into Glucose and Sorbitol (and absorbed up to 80%), Tagatose is metabolized through a very similar pathway to the metabolism of fructose in the liver (EFSA 2016), providing 3 kcal/g and de-novo lipogenesis.
Non Metabolized: Non metabolized compounds, like Alullose, Erythritol or fibers, have different metabolic fates. While Allulose and Erythritol are absorbed in the early small intestine, and excreted principally through urine, fibers are partially digested by our microflora in our colon. This is extremely relevant, as when it comes to Polyols, those which are not excreted through urine or metabolized, create an osmotic shock in our intestines and produce diarrhea, when in excess consumption usually above 10 g to 20 g per portion, depending on the Polyol. On the other hand, fibers like inulin or fructo-oligosaccharides, feed specifically beneficial bacteria in our intestines as Bifidobacteria, which has numerous positive effects into our health. However, fiber fermentation by bacteria, while healthy, can provoke bloating and other uncomfortable symptoms when in excess. Depending on the length of the fibers (and therefore their solubility), tolerance limits (that maximum dose where a person does not have any unpleasant effect) can range as well from 10 to 20 g of fiber per portion.
Building sugar replacement comes down to the building blocks that replace it’s sweetness and structure. We should look carefully into sound assembles which make from sugar replacement a wonderful opportunity to improve our health.
References
- Natália T. Correia, Hermínio P. Diogo, Joaquim J. Moura Ramos, Slow Molecular Mobility in the Amorphous Solid State of Fructose: Fragility and Aging, Journal of Food Science, 10.1111/j.1750-3841.2009.01363.x, 74, 9, (E526-E533), (2009).
- EFSA NDA Panel (EFSA Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies), 2016. Draft Scientific Opinion on the energy conversion factor of D-tagatose for labelling purposes. EFSA Journal 2016;volume(issue):NNNN, 14 pp. doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2016.NNNN
- Plaza-Díaz J, Fontana L, Gil A. Human Milk Oligosaccharides and Immune System Development. Nutrients. 2018 Aug 8;10(8):1038. doi: 10.3390/nu10081038. PMID: 30096792; PMCID: PMC6116142.
- Wölnerhanssen BK, Meyer-Gerspach AC, Beglinger C, Islam MS. Metabolic effects of the natural sweeteners xylitol and erythritol: A comprehensive review. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr. 2020;60(12):1986-1998. doi: 10.1080/10408398.2019.1623757. Epub 2019 Jun 16. PMID: 31204494.
Discovering healthy sweetness, through an understanding of what it is not
Much has been said on the topic of sweetness, and how we can best reduce the burden of chronic disease by influencing dietary choices. This has led to an appropriate focus on the role of sugar. However, most of the current efforts from lawmakers are designed to chase people away from sugar, without a clear direction for these consumers to move, or even a clear understanding of what constitutes ‘healthy’ sweetness in the first place. Typically, the discussion focuses on sugar, calories and the glycemic index, or on the differences between artificial and natural sweeteners. Consumers, meanwhile, are beginning to move ahead of this curve, and are increasingly deciding which products they best trust to deliver this outcome.
Below are a few key differentiators that may help you to build some ideas into a long-term solution for healthy sweetness, providing the opportunity for consumers to select your product as a natural part of this transition:
Are all sugars the same?
The answer is no.
While we could rate sugars in terms of their calorific content or their glycemic index, their metabolic rate would be far more relevant. Theoretically, we can say that glucose, fructose and saccharose have the same number of calories (4kcal/g) and that tagatose is a lower calorie monosaccharide (arguably between 1.5 and 3 kcal /g (EFSA, 2016)). We can also note that fructose and tagatose do not possess a high glycemic index, while glucose and saccharose do.
Do these differences make fructose and tagatose healthier molecules than sugar or glucose? Based on research, they do not.
Sucrose - or sugar, as it is better known, is comprised of glucose and fructose. Glucose metabolism allows for two key outcomes.
- Storage as glycogen in multiple tissues (including muscle)
- Creation of a feedback loop that tightly regulates glucose and its metabolites
Blood glucose rises as a response to meals, and insulin is secreted to allow proper glucose uptake by cells. When there is dysfunction in this pathway, such as insulin resistance (pre-diabetes), the levels and duration of blood glucose elevations are higher. Fructose consumption on its own does not acutely trigger a blood glucose and insulin response. However, ironically, one key cause of chronic insulin resistance is overconsumption of fructose. – which also acts the trigger for the creation of this issue in animal testing conditions.
Glucose and fructose are centrally metabolized by the liver into triglycerides, both by downregulating beta oxidation (fat burning) and by up-regulating the genetic pathways of de novo lipogenesis (DNL) (Rebollo et al, 2014). This increases blood triglycerides, as well as visceral fat accumulation, impacting the functions of those affected organs – the liver and the pancreas in particular. Fructose has been demonstrated to generate more liver fat more rapidly, versus glucose and sucrose, due to both DNL and to increased endotoxin-induced inflammation (Herck et al, 2017; Bergheim et al, 2008).
Fructose is also related to a depletion of inorganic phosphate (Abdelmalek et al 2012), which therefore negatively affects the ATP (or energetic potential) of our cells, causing an intracellular stress response. Tagatose, while lower in calories, follows the same metabolic pathway as fructose (EFSA, 2016). In order to fulfil the ultimate goal of improving health through the regulation and labeling of sugars, this process should be carefully reviewed in order to provide the right stimuli and differentiation within different sugar molecules, both for consumers and for food formulators. While consumer demand may move more swiftly than regulatory change, those who take the lead in this process are likely to reap the rewards.
Artificial sweeteners are not metabolized by our body, so do they behave as inert compounds?
Sucralose is a compound with a misleadingly natural-sounding name, as it is the result of an artificial chlorination of sugar. Because sucralose cannot be metabolized by our bodies, we assume it to be inert. According to a growing body of research however, it is becoming apparent that it is anything but inert. The synthetic triple chlorination of the sugar molecule produces the sucralose molecule – which possess a high affinity for our sweet receptors T1R2-T1R3.
Sweetness is a highly regulated process triggered in our mouths, which sends signals to our brain and initiates a cascade of reactions, including of course, the specific place and time where sweet molecules should be metabolized. The way sweetness is perceived by our cell receptors is not trivial, much like the subsequent responses of our metabolisms.
Many sweet molecules are degraded and metabolized after being sensed. Sugars and other naturally originated sweeteners, such as stevia, are instead partially or completely degraded as they pass through the digestive process. Compound such as saccharin and sucralose, on the other hand, are not degraded by our metabolism.
This is relevant, as despite the fact that we do not feel ‘sweetness’ in our livers, our pancreas’ or our fat cells, these organs remain totally capable of sensing this sweetness and can modify metabolic performance as a result. This means that, in effect, any molecule that has not been metabolized or degraded will eventually interfere and stimulate other cells in our body, out of reach of our otherwise finely tuned metabolism.
Recent research demonstrates that sucralose triggers an enhanced insulin response from our bodies when fed together with sugars (Letrit et al, 2018) and enhances the glucose uptake capacity through the enhanced synthesis of sweet receptors in lipid cells (Sanchez Tapia et al, 2019), negatively modifying the microflora profile of our guts (Freeley et al, 2014; Bian X et al, 2017).
Once we understand how profoundly sweetness impacts the coordinated metabolism of glucose and how it involves the disappearance or inactivation of the stimuli, we grasp the negative impact of an inert, un-metabolizable, artificial molecule such as sucralose. This is not the case, however, for natural stevia, which is instead degraded into steviol, and which has no negative effects along our digestive system, microflora and metabolism (Philippaert et al, 2017; Gardana et al, 2003). Furthermore, stevia is non-calorific, and thus does not feed into the metabolic pathways of sucrose nor fructose.
Considering the increasing weight of knowledge arising in the field of sweetness and sweeteners, we should once again consider the categories in which we group sweeteners. There are, absolutely, extremely relevant concepts arising beyond intensity of sweetness, calorific reward, naturality and glycemia. These concepts should seriously be taken into consideration as part of the various ongoing sugar replacement laws and bills that are currently under discussion worldwide.
Those who implement smart policies and smart business strategies, consistent with serious scientific evidence about healthy sweetness, will be rewarded.
References:
Abdelmalek MF, Lazo M, Horska A, et al. Higher dietary fructose is associated with impaired hepatic adenosine triphosphate homeostasis in obese individuals with type 2 diabetes. Hepatology. 2012;56(3):952-960. doi:10.1002/hep.25741
Bian X, Chi L, Gao B, Tu P, Ru H, Lu K. Gut Microbiome Response to Sucralose and Its Potential Role in Inducing Liver Inflammation in Mice. Front Physiol. 2017;8:487. Published 2017 Jul 24. doi:10.3389/fphys.2017.00487
Bergheim I. et al, (2008), ‘Antibiotics protect against fructose-induced hepatic lipid accumulation in mice: Role of endotoxin’, Journal of Hepatology, 48:6, pp. 983-992
EFSA NDA Panel (EFSA Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies), 2016. Draft Scientific Opinion on the energy conversion factor of D-tagatose for labelling purposes. EFSA Journal 2016;volume(issue):NNNN, 14 pp. doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2016.NNNN
Feehley, T., Nagler, C. The weighty costs of non-caloric sweeteners. Nature 514, 176–177 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature13752
Gardana C, Simonetti P, Canzi E, Zanchi R, Pietta P. Metabolism of stevioside and rebaudioside A from Stevia rebaudiana extracts by human microflora. J Agric Food Chem. 2003 Oct 22;51(22):6618-22. doi: 10.1021/jf0303619. PMID: 14558786.
Lertrit A, Srimachai S, Saetung S, Chanprasertyothin S, Chailurkit LO, Areevut C, Katekao P, Ongphiphadhanakul B, Sriphrapradang C. Effects of sucralose on insulin and glucagon-like peptide-1 secretion in healthy subjects: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Nutrition. 2018 Nov;55-56:125-130. doi: 10.1016/j.nut.2018.04.001. Epub 2018 Apr 21. PMID: 30005329.
Philippaert, K., Pironet, A., Mesuere, M. et al. Steviol glycosides enhance pancreatic beta-cell function and taste sensation by potentiation of TRPM5 channel activity. Nat Commun 8, 14733 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms14733
Rebollo, A. et al. Liquid fructose downregulates Sirt1 expression and activity and impairs the oxidation of fatty acids in rat and human liver cells. Biochim. Biophys. Acta 1841, 514–524 (2014).
Sánchez-Tapia M, Martínez-Medina J, Tovar AR, Torres N. Natural and Artificial Sweeteners and High Fat Diet Modify Differential Taste Receptors, Insulin, and TLR4-Mediated Inflammatory Pathways in Adipose Tissues of Rats. Nutrients. 2019;11(4):880. Published 2019 Apr 19. doi:10.3390/nu11040880
Van Herck, M.A. et al, (2017), Animal Models of Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease—A Starter’s Guide, Nutrients, 9(10): 1072
SWT: Leading the way to a more ethical and sustainable sweetness
At a time when consumers are looking for the healthiest and most natural products on the market, SWT offers you the chance to use our unique stevia blends, whose extraction process is 100% natural, without the use of any alcohol or additives.
At SWT, we believe in only using natural, non-GMO ingredients, and processing them with the respect that they deserve. Using our four-step, vertically integrated extraction process, we take the leaves from harvest to formulation and make sure that what you taste is the best that it can be.
Across the world, people are paying increased levels of attention to what goes into their meals. Awareness of the health problems caused by fats and sugars is causing those with a sweet tooth to look for other ways to get their sugar fix. On top of this, the sugars found in staple foods such as cereals, breads and drinks often leave the poorest with no choice but to eat unhealthy meals which have been designed for flavour, not nutrition.
As a result, healthy food is more popular than ever, but it isn’t always easy for consumers and businesses to know exactly what is in the food that they are buying, or how it is produced. Many brands, particularly producers and exporters who control the source of the supply chain, often don’t make the origins of their products clear. Worse still, many mislabel products – especially businesses in the sugar industry.
With this in mind, we have made it our mission at SWT to satisfy this demand for natural, healthy sweetness with cleanly-extracted, natural products. Growing our own crops in our own fields as well as long-term supply agreement with Engleby in Peru, we know exactly where every single leaf comes from, and we know exactly what has gone into growing it. Only our finest leaves are selected for harvest, meaning that SWT stevia is made with 100% quality in mind. Because we know what we grow, we can tell you exactly what is going into your products when you use SWT stevia. No flocculation, no crystallisation and no by-products mean that we can offer you nothing but the purest, highest quality of stevia extracts.
Our alcohol and enzyme-free extraction process is unlike any other. Using only low temperature water, we extract the sweetness from the leaves without any chemical assistance whatsoever – meaning that there is nothing but pure stevia in everything we create. This means that not only is our stevia delicious and pure – but that we also meet all FSCC 22.000 regulations and certifications. SWT it is also completely kosher and halal certified for those working with specialist product lines.
We purify our stevia using membranes and columns, as part of our certified full water production system – meaning that there is nothing in our stevia extracts except, well, extracted stevia.
The final step of our formulation process involves working with our customers to create the perfect product, made with their individual requirements in mind. This gives you the flavours you need, with the quality and guarantee that your consumers will love. Even better, our formulation uses only natural ingredients, unlike other leading brands. With SWT, you can relax, and know that you are guaranteed to enjoy the most natural stevia extractions on the market.
As if that wasn’t enough, our extraction process is one of the most sustainable in the industry, with only 0.23 tonnes of CO2 per ton of sweetness compared to traditional sugar crops. The energy we use in our production is 100% renewable (and we have the certification to prove it!). We are always looking for ways to improve, and we have worked tirelessly to reduce the amount of water in our operation, to under 50% of pre-2018 levels.
Our process has also helped us to extract 150% more sweetness from our stevia, and we are certified to the highest standards. Our completely natural, healthily sweet stevia extracts mean that whatever your product – from cakes, to ice cream, to marshmallows and beyond, SWT have the ideal flavour that you need for your products. Furthermore, we can give you an absolute guarantee that our products are everything that we say they are, providing you peace of mind as well as as great tasting, healthy, end product.
Making the switch to SWT means that not only are you providing better, more ethically produced ingredients, you’re also helping to meet the demands of customers across the globe. SWT stevia is so delicious because it is so natural – our flavours are the result of care at every stage of the production process. With a 0 GMO guarantee, you can be sure that SWT only produces genuine stevia, which we never genetically modify at any stage of the process.
SWT: The healthiest way to enjoy an impossibly sweet, impossibly delicious treat
Everyone wants to eat that second piece of cake and to treat themselves to the extra scoop of ice cream. Unfortunately, it isn’t always the right decision when dealing with snack foods that are often high in sugars and fats. Impossibly sweet treats are usually impossibly unhealthy as well. With global awareness of issues surrounding sustainability, obesity and a desire to reduce sugar and fat content, it can be tricky to walk the line between traditional snacks and modern expectations of diet.
As if these consumer demands weren’t enough, there is also a renewed focus on the reduction of environmental damage and and increased desire for sustainability, despite evidence that consumers are largely unwilling to change their habits.
This puts pressure on food and beverage producers to change the way that we operate in order to meet these demands, while ensuring that there is no tangible difference to the family-favourite products that we bring to market.
Luckily, at SWT, we have developed an incredible, 100% natural, chemical and enzyme free stevia blend that has proven to be able to give you all of these things. Working in our laboratories and test kitchens, we have created sugar substitutes that produce the same effects as traditional sugars, without the negatives associated with high-sugar and high-calorie ingredients.
On average, we can help you remove over 90% simply by substituting the sugar in your goods for our stevia blends – before any further reformulation action is taken. The work that our bakery team has put in has paid off, and now SWT can help you to achieve near 0 added sugar on almost the entirety of your range of baked goods.
A fantastic example of this is our traditional lemon cake, where our team of SWT chefs have achieved a 29% reduction in calories thanks to the use of our Naturalysa Ice formulation and our reduced-fat butter, with 20% less fat and 22% less saturated fat as a result.
Using Naturalysa helped our SWT Brownies not only to have a 94% sugar reduction content, but also 13% less fats than compared to traditional brownies. A 22% reduction in cholesterol also demonstrates the fantastic applications of stevia as we move towards a healthier, but more delicious world.
Our SWT vanilla cookies boast 120 fewer calories per serving as a result of making the switch from sugar, and a combined fat reduction of 63.5% in addition to having 96% less sugar overall when compared to traditional formulations.
With the ability to reduce the calorie and sugar contents of popular products, you can take your product lines to the next level.
Of course, these changes to nutrition do not affect all the beneficial nutrients that are found in these products – so there is literally nothing to lose and everything to gain by making the switch from cane sugar to stevia. We are not aware of any better way to reduce the sugar and fat content of your goods with absolutely no change to the flavour and texture.
Our laboratories have developed applications for stevia that go further than just cakes. Ice cream, marshmallows and even breakfast cereals can all benefits from a range of applications – improving crunch, shine, texture and maintain the structure that consumers love from your products. SWT can help you to achieve this while improving the nutritional values of your food overall.
It’s not just sugar that we can help you with either. By using SWT, we can help you to reduce your fat content across product lines as well, ensuring that the food that reaches supermarket shelves is delicious and nutritious – something not often seen in the current retail environment. This gives any producer using stevia instead of sugar an enormous advantage – literally straight out of the box.
Our drive for a better kind of food goes beyond the kitchen too. All SWT products are sustainably produced and are an environmentally friendly alternative to traditional cane sugars. Produced using renewable energy and processed exclusively using aqueous techniques, making SWT an essential part of your ingredients means a long-term commitment to supply chain sustainability.
Building a world in which sweetness is an opportunity to deliver health and naturalness to our loved ones in each meal, in each drink is the intrinsic mission of SWT Stevia. We sweeten the impossible.
SWT believes in building a world where every naturally delicious meal can deliver health and wellbeing. SWT Stevia, we sweeten the impossible.
Sweetness beyond labelling
¿How are labeling regulations evoving?
Several regulations are ruling our way out of an excessive consumption of sugar. The Nutri Score in France, UK and other European countries, the traffic light labeling of nutrients, and more recently the black signal regulations in Chile, Israel, Peru and Mexico, are making more and less successful efforts to communicate to consumers the nutritional quality of foods, and ultimately improving their behaviors. While some labeling regulations, like the Nutriscore, qualify foods in five categories resulting from their nutrition quality, other systems like the ecuatorian traffic light qualifies critical nutrients, like salts, sugar, calories and saturated fats in four categories (green, white, yellow and red). This seems to be a simple and educative method to let consumers choice. Countries which have implemented black seals, like Chile, Israel or Peru, point into the nutrient density of the food, comparing at a 100g portion every food and setting challenging threshold to keep a product out of the black seal, especially when it comes to sugar. Any product having more sugar than plain milk receives the black seal. The upside of these regulation approach is the fact that there are no portion tricks to make a “bad product” look “good”. However, it is difficult to compare at the same weight a yoghurt, which you eat in 200 g portion, to butter, which you eat in 5 to 10 g portions. Also, both approaches fail when comparing sugars which have a completely different metabolic fate. Therefore, a non- dairy milk equivalent sweetened with fructose or glucose based carbohydrates, would be rated the same than milk, which combination of sugars (glucose and galactose) is far better in terms of glycemic index and overall metabolic fate of the sugars it contains. Recently approved and published law in Mexico specifically created seals to dissuade consumers for using high levels of sugar, anything about 10% of the calories of the product supplied by sugar. However, just as products with medium /high levels of sugar will be sold with a Stop black seal “High in Sugars”, if you decide to replace any amount of sugar with a high intensity sweetener, even those which can provide synergies and benefits, such as stevia, you will need to write “Contains sweeteners, not recommended for kids”. Any reasonable person reading this will understand that from a marketing point of view, a product high in sugars will have higher chances to be accepted by a customer to a product with a reduced amount of sugar but containing sweeteners and showing a terrible note inviting children to stay away from the product. Therefore, the law is suggesting all and every food manufacturers to keep or replace back sugar into their foods, probably the opposite effect to that one first considered when designing the law.
So: What do we propose?
We consider that the problem is really about three key elements: Setting our metabolism back to the clockwork set up for which it was designed, and out of what is called the metabolic syndrome, and supporting this with reasonable physical activity. In parallel, educate public and law makers in the needed differentiations among sugars, high intensity sweeteners and fats.
Better Labeling
A simple distinction in those sugar our body can process, turn into sugar or store properly, like glucose, and other which our body will have further difficulties to process, will deplete our phosphate cell reservoirs, and will ultimately increase our fat storage could make a world of differences. The same concept applies to the proper differentiation of fats. Highly oxidative oils should be properly differentiated and receive the right warning messages when compared when healthy fats like cocoa, olive oil and others, such as MCT oil. This distinction could really stimulate producers to re formulate foods properly and society cash out the benefits of this reformulation.
Better Eating habits
When it comes to habits, this means, to consciously reduce the consumption of inflammatory foods or poor nutrients, like fructose or oxidative fats. This will allow our cell metabolism to go back to high mitochondrial energy and let our reservoirs of nutrients grow, together with cleaning up our nutrient signaling systems and ultimately allowing our metabolic machinery to re balance. The good news is that probably a pain less reduction in the consumption of sugars, the avoidance of artificial sweeteners and the right profile of fat consumption, can fix this enormous dis-balance produced by life style and could allow us to take our body back to a self regulated homeostatic state. Getting a diet where you get ideally below 50 g of sugar a day, and ideally 25 g, is not difficult at all. We can not only have a delicious diet below 50 g of sugar, but we can re balance your metabolism and have the sweet reward we deserve a few times a day, enriching our prebiotic feed and avoiding any damaging metabolic signals to our sweet and GLUT receptors.
Better Body moving Habits
Finally, our last change relates to our physical habits. Have you thought of muscle and fat as real organs of our body? Even 15 to 30 minutes of exercise a day can completely change the way your body deals with nutrition. A single cell does not make a change, but building muscle tissues is a full new opportunity to our bodies. It is like receiving a “brand new organ” capable of producing more energy (we can increase dramatically the capacity of our cells to produce more energy, through mitochondrial synthesis), store more glucose and react better to metabolic changes. Together, many cells of any kind can fully make a metabolic difference. The more muscle we have, the higher capacity we have to be more energetic, store glycogen and have glucose buffer capacity, as well as an overall wellbeing. The other way around happens with glucose craving, inflammatory fat cells. The more we have, they will behave like an inflammatory organ inside our bodies. And three weeks of a different habit can fully change the way this landscape looks like and feels, for one side or the other.
Stevia helps in the fight against Diabetes
A recent study (2017) published by Nature found that steviol and steviol glycosides help in the control of Type II diabetes mellitus through the regulation of the TRPM5 mechanism. The study determined that the sweet compounds of the stevia plant act in the regulation of the complex mechanism existing in pancreas cells which regulate the release of insulin. The interesting thing is that the activity of stevia on this mechanism occurs only in the presence of high levels of glucose in the blood and not when glucose levels are low or normal. Although there is abundant literature on the potentially beneficial effects of stevia related to the control of Type II Diabetes Mellitus, this is the first study that demonstrates the positive and beneficial effect of stevia natural glycosides on the mechanism of insulin production.
When are we really talking about stevia?
The annual meeting of CODEX held in February of this year (2018) settled the directives for labeling those sweeteners identical to those produced by the stevia plant but synthesized through genetically modified yeasts (GMO). In particular CODEX determined that those extracts produced by fermentation or modified enzymatically should be identified with different INS ( E ) numbers different from those produced by the Stevia Rebaudiana Bertoni plant. While an overall category INS (E)960 will group all steviol glycosides INS (E)960a will be used for stevia plant synthesized glycosides with INS (E)960c for GMO yeast synthesized glycosides and further categories should be defined for enzymatically produced glycosides (whenever applications by manufacturers are submitted) which are not directly extracted from the plant.
Juan Carlos Fischer the President of the American Federation of Stevia celebrated this news, “We think this is excellent news for the benefit of the producers of stevia extracts and their crops, as it is a matter of common sense. Would it be conceivable to name a product as milk when there are no cows involved (dairy organizations are aggressively opposed to any hint, and even to the marketing on nearby shelves of these products) or tequila without agave or wine that does not come from grapes? Just as consumers and producers of these products do not accept misleading marketing, we believe it’s not conceivable to speak of Stevia, to make use of stevia leaves pictures or to suggest this name when the origins differ from the plant”. This has nothing to do with product quality or safety which is out of doubt but it has to do with consumer expectations on the natural origin of stevia.
La Stevia contra la Diabetes
Pruebas Científicas sobre los beneficios de la Stevia en la diabetes.
Un estudio recientemente (2017) publicado por la revista Nature determinó que el steviol y los glicósidos de steviol ayudan en el control de la diabetes mellitus Tipo II a través de la regulación del mecanismo TRPM5. El estudio determinó que los compuestos dulces de la planta de la stevia actúan en la regulación del complejo mecanismo existente en células del páncreas que regula la liberación de la insulina. Lo interesante es que la actividad de la stevia sobre este mecanismo se produce solamente en presencia de altos niveles de glucosa en la sangre y no cuando los niveles de glucosa son bajos o normales. Si bien existe abundante bibliografía sobre los posibles efectos benéficos de la stevia en ayudar al control de la Diabetes Mellitus Tipo II, este es el primer estudio que demuestra el efecto positivo y benéfico de los endulzantes de stevia en el mecanismo de producción de la insulina.