News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link 50 years ago. Parent comment

Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by gtrubetskoy on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @03:47PM (#15760478)
Because price per pound: Erythritol: $20 Sugar: $0.44

Source: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mhVolO...

[Google cache, the original PDF is 404 Not Found]

Edit: looks like one can find erythritol for as little as $15, which is still 34 times more than sugar.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by LolWolf on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @07:04PM (#15761770)
I think it's not weight-by-weight equivalent. I believe that a tiny amount of Erythritol is enough to be equivalently sweet relative to a much larger amount of sugar.

That being said: I'm not sure if it's enough to make it cheaper than sugar.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by gtrubetskoy on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @08:43PM (#15762168)
Good point, and there is another twist I realized: sugar is used as filler (e.g. for removed fat in low-fat stuff), so Erythritol might not work because same volume of it would make it unbearably sweet.

Personally, I'd prefer they just kept the original fat and call it a day as there seems to be absolutely nothing wrong with it health-wise.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by silviogutierrez on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @10:52PM (#15762605)
You are both thinking of other sweeteners, like sucralose (Splenda).

Erythritol is actually 70% as sweet as sugar. So you actually need to supplement it with something else to match sugar.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by wlesieutre on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @04:31PM (#15760847)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erythritol

> Doses over 50 grams (1.8 oz) can cause severe diarrhea, plus a significant increase in nausea and stomach rumbling.

I don't know what the weight ratio would be to substitute that for sugar, but a can of soda has ~40g of sugar so I'm guessing you need to be careful with it similar to other sugar alcohols.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by donjoe on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @03:57PM (#15760563)
Switch to stevia instead?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by hans_mueller on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @06:53PM (#15761732)
no, switch to xylitol.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by chiefalchemist on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @07:40PM (#15761946)
No. Train yourself to avoid sweeteners all together :)
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by hans_mueller on Thursday November 23, 2017 @02:25AM (#15763462)
even better
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by leadingthenet on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @04:01PM (#15760595)
Well sure, now. But once the forces of scale take over it could potentially become cheaper than sugar.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Sugar industry withheld possible evidence of cancer link ... by pizza234 on Wednesday November 22, 2017 @04:14PM (#15760709)
> Doses over 50 grams (1.8 oz) can cause severe diarrhea, plus a significant increase in nausea and stomach rumbling.

... and that's "just" 50 grams.

[ Parent | on HN ]