Sugar is considered as one of the enemy. When it comes to follow healthy-diet, the major ingredient which is removed is sugar. Honey and Jaggery, both of these are sweet in taste but these products are considered healthy compared to sugar. So what do you think, what makes white sugar our enemy? Why do health-practitioners ask to cut down refined white sugar from the diet?
Well, one of the major reason behind this is the glycemic index (GI) of sugar. Glycemic index is actually how carbohydrates, that we eat, affects our blood sugar level. Upon consumption, if the spike in blood sugar level is high, food is considered as high GI food whereas if blood sugar increase slowly, food is considered to have low GI.
Generally glycemic index is divided in three categories:
• Low GI: 55 or less
• Medium GI: 56-69
• High GI: 70+
Sugar is always considered high GI because of its readily digestible nature. Making a low GI sugar is indeed an amazing innovation of the decade. But how does it happened? Is there any chemical treatment given to the sugar or is it artificially made? How scientist did altered this property of sugar?
To understand all these, first we need to understand how sugar is digested in our digestive system.
Once we consume sugar, there are various transporters in small intestine which transport glucose molecules to the blood stream. GLUT2 is one of the major transporter for the transfer of glucose to blood. The sucrose is first bound to the enzyme which facilitates its breakdown in glucose and fructose, followed by transport of glucose to the blood stream by GLUT2 transporter.
To make low GI sugar, the digestion process is targeted as opportunity. When we consume sugar in natural form (in fruits/Jaggery/sugarcane), we consume not only sucrose but also flavonoids and polyphenols. These flavonoids and polyphenols hinders the binding of sucrose to the enzyme henceforth, breakdown of sucrose to glucose and fructose happens slowly. Since sucrose can’t be transported by GLUT2 to the blood, and glucose is generated slowly due to flavonoids, there is no sudden spike in blood sugar level even after eating sugar.
This is the major opportunity which Nucane life adopted to make their low GI sugar. In the product, no chemical treatment is given or no artificial ingredients are added. Rather the product is more pure than the white sugar where refining is done lesser than white sugar. Due to less refining, more polyphenols and flavonoids are retained in the products, henceforth, making it low GI in nature. This helps in reducing the bio-availability of glucose by 20% and keeps the blood sugar level normal. Moreover, this raw sugar retains all natural micronutrients, delivering a defined caramel sweetness, which is perceived sweeter henceforth, promotes 10% sugar reduction in food system.
The nucane technology is adopted in India as well by Tatva India. They have recently launched low GI sugar, under the brand name ‘Kesari Golden Sugar’. As per the brand claim, kesari golden sugar is 55 GI (25% low GI), GMO Free, diabetic friendly, chemical free, and sulphur free.
Further, there are many brands available worldwide with low GI sugaras a product in their portfolio.
In search of an alternative for sugar, sweeteners were available but with limitations. This low GI sugar is indeed a promising alternative to proceed with the low sugar and healthy products, across all product categories.
So what are your thoughts on this?
Reference:
Inhibition of the intestinal glucose transporter GLUT2 by flavonoids. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17172639/
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