Aspartame: effects and natural substitutes

Recently, the controversy over excessive use of aspartame in foods has been lit despite conflicting studies on the long-term side effects that it seems to have: there are so many questions we ask ourselves with regards to this white powder so much used in the food industry, but that also arouses so many perplexities! Let's try to understand something to make a wise choice. Although this substance is approved for use in food in 1981, for more than eight years the FDA (Food and Drug Administration ) has refused to approve the use of aspartame due to conflicting results in studies of experimentation of what at the time was one of the most sensational discoveries: a sweetener with a high sweetening power and zero calories compared to the common cooking sugar.

Aspartame seems to cause "slow and silent" damage in all those people who are so unlucky that they do not have immediate reactions and therefore do not have a reason to avoid it, until they reach carcinogenic effects . But in what foods is it contained? Many products that we find on our shopping list: light drinks, pastry and confectionery products, yoghurt, chewing gum, low-calorie products for weight control or as a real table-top sweetener, replacing the common sugar. We can identify the presence of this substance by reading the list of ingredients, in foods it can be reported either by the name "aspartame" or by the number E-951 .

We are not discouraged because a little good will is enough to find natural substitutes for aspartame ! It is a fact that this type of sweetener is suitable for particular situations and needs that the most common sweeteners cannot compete with: low calorific value (being about 200 times sweeter than sucrose it is used at very low quantity) and does not raise the blood glucose (suitable for diabetic patients). It becomes difficult to find a substitute at the height, finding an exit in the maze of artificial and natural sweeteners is not easy, but in our small daily choices we can choose a worthy substitute among natural sweeteners like stevia, maple syrup, honey and many others !