Going sugar-free is pretty easy if you know what you’re doing. From sugar free chocolate to switching out sugar in baking, you too can live a sugar-free life if you want to.

But in order to follow a sugar-free diet, you need to understand why sugar has such a bad rap, and why you need to go sugar-free in the first place.

 

How much sugar is too much?

If you think you consume too much sugar, you probably do.

The American Heart Association says that the RDA sugar intake for men is 37.5g (which equates to 9 teaspoons) and 25g for women (roughly 6 teaspoons). But when you consider a ‘full fat’ can of coke containing 9g of sugar, a simple soda will use up your entire daily allowance (if you’re a guy) and push you well over the limit (if you’re a girl).

And did you know that in the US alone, sugar consumption makes up 17% of our total daily calorie intake and 14% of children’s daily calorie intake?

So if you’re consuming that much sugar in a day, why not opt for a better sugar variety? And before you ask, not all sugars are created equal.

 

What is sugar?

White sugar is an incredibly highly processed sugar that is commonplace in so many ready-made foods. The only thing this sugar is designed to do is add sweetness to a food product, nothing else.

White sugar has no nutritional value, none. No nutrients, no minerals, no vitamins.

Natural sugars, on the other hand, are much healthier than white sugar, although they do tend to be slightly misunderstood. Natural sugars can be broken into two further categories – processed and unprocessed natural sugar.

Processed natural sugars are things like maple syrup, honey, agave nectar, for example. And while these are typically considered to be a healthier option than white sugar, you should still limit your consumption of them because they’re still high in calories with little nutritional benefit.

Unprocessed natural sugars, on the other hand, are the sugars that are naturally occurring in foodstuffs like fruit and vegetables. These types of sugar are the ones that our body actually needs.

The sugars found in fruits and vegetables not only give our bodies the energy they require but because it is delivered in tandem with a fruit or a vegetable, a foodstuff that is made up of so many other amazing things such as vitamins, minerals and fiber for example, it doesn’t just give you an energy boost, it gives you so much more.

So what can you do to reduce your sugar intake?

 

How to reduce your sugar intake

There are so many easy ways to reduce your sugar intake from opting for sugar-free chocolate over the sugar-laden, mainstream varieties, to taking your tea or coffee with sweetener rather than 3 teaspoons of sugar, to looking for foods that contain alternatives to sugar such as agave, or stevia or xylitol.

There is a world of sugar-free options readily available to you, you just have to look for them.