For a long time I was convinced that I could and would have the resolve of a Buddhist monk and almost completely cut out certain foods from my life. A big problem I have with losing weight is that I have a very sensitive sense of taste (and am picky as hell about a variety of other things like texture, spice, etc). I can easily distinguish 'full flavor' foods from 'lite' and low fat/calorie foods. Something that I especially hate(d) is that when you try to lose weight, you inevitably run into The Fake Sugars. Sucralose (Splenda), aspartame (Equal), saccharin (Sweet N Low), Stevia plant sugar (Truvia) and all their friends are most unwelcome in my mouth. I can immediately taste the difference and find it hard to stomach the taste. Even their smell is distinct, as blindfolded I have identified on several occasions Diet Coke from Coke on scent alone.
As I write this, the taste of aspartame sweetened Iced Tea hangs in my mouth from a glass I had over a half hour ago. Damn do these artificial sweeteners have staying power!
I finally realized that drinking water, skim milk, and 100% juice won't even satisfy me as I love the tastes of iced tea, coffee, soda, and everything else that will add about 1,000 extra calories a day. Even pure, 100% juice has a lot of calories in it and it's supposed to be 'good' for you! So I've resigned myself to start the incorporation of fake sugars in my every day life, very much to the chagrin of my taste buds. I can only stand so much water, to the point that disliking the taste of Splenda and Aspartame isn't enough to keep me from trying to enjoy iced teas and sodas sweetened with these two abominations.
While I don't think I'll be fully abandoning sugar ever, I must say that my hierarchy of fake sweeteners from most tolerable to least is as follows:
-Sucralose/Splenda
-Aspartame/Equal: actually, it's kind of tied with Splenda, but the pure texture of Aspartame is less pleasant to me
-Saccharin/Sweet N Low
-Anything ending in 'tol' (Sorbitol, Maltitol, etc): These are technically sugar alcohols used widely in diabetic friendly foods & candies, but they cause 'gastrointestinal distress' which just weirds me out. I've never eaten enough of these to have a real issue, but I don't really want to find out how much I would have to eat for the effects to become apparent...
-Stevia (Truvia, or any other plant based sweeteners): Just nasty. I hate these so much that after a few sips of the Vitamin Waters with stevia I had to pour the rest out. Usually with the rest I can stand a full bottle or cup well enough
In keeping with this theme, I highly warn anyone with acute taste such as I've described against drinking the Turkey Hill Farm Decaf Diet Orange Iced Tea. The aspartame taste hits you first, followed by a pathetic attempt at a fake orangey flavor to conceal the awfulness of it. The end result is a short wave of tolerable fake sugar followed by a wave of nasty that has a real staying power on the taste buds.
I have to run to Accounting class soon, but I'm working on making more review posts of the foods I've been using to control my calorie in take. Just FYI, Smart Ones Swedish Meatballs aren't that horrible, and that's coming from a real fan of traditional Swedish Meatballs!
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