question

Hello to all my friends, I have a question. Elissa took me by the hand and walked me thru Trader Joe the weekend b4 surgery and now I am grocery shopping for myself now. She stated to watch the sugar and protein, but is there any difference with sugar alcohol and actual sugar. Is there anything special besides these to things I should look out for??? Thanks for any advice, Cynthia

Hey Cynthia, It is fairly straight forward to look for the protein and sugar count. Proteins are good, sugar should never be more than 6 or 7 grams per serving. Excess sugar can cause dumping for some people if they are lucky. Sugar alcohol is the evil one. Most lo-carb products do not count the sugar alcohol in their counts, sometimes not even listing them. Sugar alcohol (things such as malitol, etc) can have a laxative effect. You can usually figure out the amount of sugar alcohol in a product if not listed by subtracting total carbs minus dietary fiber and sugar. The missing carbs are almost always sugar alcohol. Most protein bars are loaded with sugar alcohol. Some people can tolerate them better than others. The good sugar alcohol is sucralose or splenda. My two cents. Rob

Cynthia, Sugar alcohol grams add to sugar for the total. They are the same. No more than 6 grams total for me. I just don't even buy it if it's more than that. My hubby doesn't need it either. I don't deprive him, I still buy ice cream and I made a SF cheese cake with SF cherry's on top or an occasional cake. I might taste it, but usually tasting is enough for right now. How's it going otherwise? How are you feeling? Hope all is good. ((HUGS)) Elissa

Personally sugar alchohols make me sick as a dog! sugar does too if I have too much but I can have more of the regular sugar than the sugar alcohols. Alot of the sugar free chocolate has high sugar alcohols and man oh man do I get nauseous! atkins chocolate bars always makes me really sick! so just be careful of that sugar alcohol! Best Wishes! Elizabeth M