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L-arabinose is a thing and it's natural. Only really available in Japan though. Might give you some gas because some bacteria can break it down, but probably

L-arabinose is a thing and it's natural. Only really available in Japan though. Might give you some gas because some bacteria can break it down, but probably not as bad as xylitol, erythritol, etc.

dvirsky 4y ago
Doesn't allulose work pretty much the same way?
- throwawaymaths 4y ago
  Ooh, I should try that sometime
  - dvirsky 4y ago
    It's pretty awesome in terms of taste - it's just a bit less sweet but tastes just like sugar. I didn't find too much info on impact but it seems pretty safe. And you can really use it as a sugar, it even caramelizes. I use it to make home made sugar free ice cream with real sugary consistency. But for me personally, having too much of it makes my stomach rebel.
    - throwawaymaths 4y ago
      Yeah I think arabinose is likely to have less of a GI effect (I have eaten some from the lab on a whim) but I can't find any references on this.
      - semi-extrinsic 4y ago
        The GI effect should be just directly correlated with how well large intestine microbiome can ferment these, IIUC? And I guess also with how much you need to have equivalent taste of 1 g sugar. As in, if it tastes sweet but is not absorbed in the small intestine, so has "no calories", it will inevitably all pass on to the large intestine where it can be fermented. As someone who absolutely hates the synthetic taste of aspartame etc. but has to stay on a low-FODMAP diet, I've just resigned to eating stuff with ordinary sugar and using sufficient moderation.
        throwawaymaths 4y ago
        According to the big W, part of it is due to inhibiting digestion of normal sugar, which tracks my understanding of chemistry. So there's a lot of factors.
        golem14 4y ago
        I would imagine that if humans did use it at scale, it wouldn't be long until the microbiome was evolving to metabolize it.
    - Melatonic 4y ago
      Do you use an ice cream maker?
      - dvirsky 4y ago
        Yeah. I can't say that I've gotten to professional quality but I'm a bit lazy with the recipes.
      - linsomniac 4y ago
        I also love Allulose for ice cream. It costs around $25 for 2lbs bag from Amazon, that lasts us 2-3 months. It doesn't have that "fake sugar" taste, or the weirdness you get with some of the alcohol sugars (my wife once made cookies that were "cold" when you ate them because of the sugar alcohol, it was a really weird sensation. We got a Ninja Creami, it's not a traditional ice cream maker, you freeze these pint cups, then run them through the machine and it shaves it then blends it. My preferred recipe is: a quarter cup 0% yogurt, 2-4tbs allulose, pinch of xantham gum, the remainder fruit (strawberry, blueberry, canned low sugar pears or mandarin oranges or pineapple or peaches). This is delicious, low calorie (140-240cal per pint), and low sugar. It hits all the "ice cream" centers in my brain. My wife takes it much fancier, she will make a vanilla base, and then often make low sugar mix ins (fudge, choc chips, caramel (with allulose), peanut butter cups (with PB2), marshmallows). The Creami is noisy as hell for 3 minutes, and I wasn't sure how much we'd actually use it, but we've used it a lot. We got it on sale, about half price, which made it easier. Woot sometimes has them about this price (more like $100 than $200). One down side is that you basically have to re-blend it every time you want some, the remains largely freeze back into solid, though if you hit it with the microwave for 20 seconds you can kind of chunk it up and eat the flakes. Not really ice cream at that point.
- hebrox 4y ago
  It's not legal yet in Europe, but can't wait to try it out!
cassianoleal 4y ago
It's available in the UK but it's quite expensive. Sold as a pre-meal supplement from what I can tell.
- cassianoleal 4y ago
  Kinda weird to be downvoted for the above. GP said L-arabinose's available in Japan only. I responded to that. Could one of the downvoters please at least let me know what about my comment was so bad? For reference, here's one place that sells it in the uk [0]. It's made in the UK as well. Directions are: Take 2g of Powder approximately 30 minutes before main meals. Which matches the second part of my post (pre-meal supplement). [0] https://www.sweetcures.co.uk/products/l-arabinose-original-powder https://www.sweetcures.co.uk/products/l-arabinose-original-p...
  - gregw2 4y ago
    I am not your downvoter, but after upvoting on my phone a few times I started to realize it wasn't really clear whether my fat finger hit the up arrow or the down arrow; there is not clear feedback[1]. Since then, I've found myself concerned I might have downvoted a post I really liked, so I unvote, zoom in, and revote. Even then sometimes I've remained unclear/nervous and had to zoom yet again. I'm not sure others are aware of this UI issue or make the effort in this regard. This is a non-issue on my laptop where the cursor is quite visible and precise. [1] Writing this post encouraged me to experiment. I guess if you vote up, you get an option to "unvote" but if you accidentally downvote, the option is to "undown". So there is more visible feedback about your vote than I was aware of. I will probably look for that going forward to ensure my voting intention was properly registered. But it's not super-obvious.
    - taylodl 4y ago
      I've done the same thing. Now whenever I intend to upvote I always zoom in to make sure I'm hitting the correct arrow!
    - hanche 4y ago
Melatonic 4y ago
Any good sources you know of? Unless we are talking crazy expensive I feel like it could be pretty useful for a lot of home recipes. I don't make that much sugary stuff anyway. Does it caramelize like normal sugar when heated?
- throwawaymaths 4y ago
  I would be surprised if it didn't caramelize. I don't know of any good sources, sorry.
- adgjlsfhk1 4y ago
  it does. it behaves identically to regular sugar except in how it interacts with other organic compounds.
- HyperSane 4y ago
  $110/KG here https://www.scbt.com/p/l--glucose-921-60-8?lang=en&cur=usd&srsltid=AR5OiO1aVbQ6o509Rgt08sUdmlgt3HrXFgJvua4edf3S2J3qgv7boyNIsGk https://www.scbt.com/p/l--glucose-921-60-8?lang=en&cur=usd&s...
petra 4y ago
Another alternative is duox-matok's technology, that increases the surface area of sugar or something similar, and this allows to use 30%-50% less sugar for the same sweetness effect.
annpierce 4y ago
Just for clarification, are you implying L-arabinose is the left-handed isomer of glucose?

L-arabinose is a thing and it's natural. Only really available in Japan though. Might give you some gas because some bacteria can break it down, but probably not as bad as xylitol, erythritol, etc.

dvirsky 4y ago

Doesn't allulose work pretty much the same way?

throwawaymaths 4y ago
Ooh, I should try that sometime
- dvirsky 4y ago
  It's pretty awesome in terms of taste - it's just a bit less sweet but tastes just like sugar. I didn't find too much info on impact but it seems pretty safe. And you can really use it as a sugar, it even caramelizes. I use it to make home made sugar free ice cream with real sugary consistency. But for me personally, having too much of it makes my stomach rebel.
  - throwawaymaths 4y ago
    Yeah I think arabinose is likely to have less of a GI effect (I have eaten some from the lab on a whim) but I can't find any references on this.
    - semi-extrinsic 4y ago
      The GI effect should be just directly correlated with how well large intestine microbiome can ferment these, IIUC? And I guess also with how much you need to have equivalent taste of 1 g sugar. As in, if it tastes sweet but is not absorbed in the small intestine, so has "no calories", it will inevitably all pass on to the large intestine where it can be fermented. As someone who absolutely hates the synthetic taste of aspartame etc. but has to stay on a low-FODMAP diet, I've just resigned to eating stuff with ordinary sugar and using sufficient moderation.
      - throwawaymaths 4y ago
        According to the big W, part of it is due to inhibiting digestion of normal sugar, which tracks my understanding of chemistry. So there's a lot of factors.
      - golem14 4y ago
        I would imagine that if humans did use it at scale, it wouldn't be long until the microbiome was evolving to metabolize it.
  - Melatonic 4y ago
    Do you use an ice cream maker?
    - dvirsky 4y ago
      Yeah. I can't say that I've gotten to professional quality but I'm a bit lazy with the recipes.
    - linsomniac 4y ago
      I also love Allulose for ice cream. It costs around $25 for 2lbs bag from Amazon, that lasts us 2-3 months. It doesn't have that "fake sugar" taste, or the weirdness you get with some of the alcohol sugars (my wife once made cookies that were "cold" when you ate them because of the sugar alcohol, it was a really weird sensation. We got a Ninja Creami, it's not a traditional ice cream maker, you freeze these pint cups, then run them through the machine and it shaves it then blends it. My preferred recipe is: a quarter cup 0% yogurt, 2-4tbs allulose, pinch of xantham gum, the remainder fruit (strawberry, blueberry, canned low sugar pears or mandarin oranges or pineapple or peaches). This is delicious, low calorie (140-240cal per pint), and low sugar. It hits all the "ice cream" centers in my brain. My wife takes it much fancier, she will make a vanilla base, and then often make low sugar mix ins (fudge, choc chips, caramel (with allulose), peanut butter cups (with PB2), marshmallows). The Creami is noisy as hell for 3 minutes, and I wasn't sure how much we'd actually use it, but we've used it a lot. We got it on sale, about half price, which made it easier. Woot sometimes has them about this price (more like $100 than $200). One down side is that you basically have to re-blend it every time you want some, the remains largely freeze back into solid, though if you hit it with the microwave for 20 seconds you can kind of chunk it up and eat the flakes. Not really ice cream at that point.
hebrox 4y ago
It's not legal yet in Europe, but can't wait to try it out!

cassianoleal 4y ago

It's available in the UK but it's quite expensive. Sold as a pre-meal supplement from what I can tell.

cassianoleal 4y ago
Kinda weird to be downvoted for the above. GP said L-arabinose's available in Japan only. I responded to that. Could one of the downvoters please at least let me know what about my comment was so bad? For reference, here's one place that sells it in the uk [0]. It's made in the UK as well. Directions are: Take 2g of Powder approximately 30 minutes before main meals. Which matches the second part of my post (pre-meal supplement). [0] https://www.sweetcures.co.uk/products/l-arabinose-original-powder https://www.sweetcures.co.uk/products/l-arabinose-original-p...
- gregw2 4y ago
  I am not your downvoter, but after upvoting on my phone a few times I started to realize it wasn't really clear whether my fat finger hit the up arrow or the down arrow; there is not clear feedback[1]. Since then, I've found myself concerned I might have downvoted a post I really liked, so I unvote, zoom in, and revote. Even then sometimes I've remained unclear/nervous and had to zoom yet again. I'm not sure others are aware of this UI issue or make the effort in this regard. This is a non-issue on my laptop where the cursor is quite visible and precise. [1] Writing this post encouraged me to experiment. I guess if you vote up, you get an option to "unvote" but if you accidentally downvote, the option is to "undown". So there is more visible feedback about your vote than I was aware of. I will probably look for that going forward to ensure my voting intention was properly registered. But it's not super-obvious.
  - taylodl 4y ago
    I've done the same thing. Now whenever I intend to upvote I always zoom in to make sure I'm hitting the correct arrow!
  - hanche 4y ago

Melatonic 4y ago

Any good sources you know of? Unless we are talking crazy expensive I feel like it could be pretty useful for a lot of home recipes. I don't make that much sugary stuff anyway. Does it caramelize like normal sugar when heated?

throwawaymaths 4y ago
I would be surprised if it didn't caramelize. I don't know of any good sources, sorry.
adgjlsfhk1 4y ago
it does. it behaves identically to regular sugar except in how it interacts with other organic compounds.
HyperSane 4y ago
$110/KG here https://www.scbt.com/p/l--glucose-921-60-8?lang=en&cur=usd&srsltid=AR5OiO1aVbQ6o509Rgt08sUdmlgt3HrXFgJvua4edf3S2J3qgv7boyNIsGk https://www.scbt.com/p/l--glucose-921-60-8?lang=en&cur=usd&s...

petra 4y ago

Another alternative is duox-matok's technology, that increases the surface area of sugar or something similar, and this allows to use 30%-50% less sugar for the same sweetness effect.

annpierce 4y ago

Just for clarification, are you implying L-arabinose is the left-handed isomer of glucose?