When coming off of a sugar addiction, oftentimes a cold turkey approach doesn’t work. Instead, a substitution is a great way to help provide a solution!

Monk fruit sweetener has been celebrated as a revolutionary way to sweeten foods and drinks without the harmful effects of traditional sugar and artificial sweeteners. Artificial sweeteners like aspartame and sucralose have been shown to contribute to obesity and diabetes along with dysbiosis of the microbiome and gut lining.

Monk fruit is a natural plant-based sweetener derived from the Chinese Perennial plant (Siraitia grosvenoriii) also known as luo-han-guo. This fruit has origins of cultivation by Buddhist monks in high-altitude regions of China.

Monk fruit contains the potent antioxidant curcubitane triterpenoid glycoside, Mogroside V. This antioxidant is over 300x sweeter than sucrose. The major advantage is that it has ZERO calories. It doesn’t dysregulate your blood sugar. Most importantly, in my opinion, it isn’t harmful for your teeth like sugar is.

I’ve personally been using Monk Fruit to sweeten recipes when it calls for sweetness. I don’t feel uncontrollable cravings after use nor do I need to use a lot because it is sweeter than sugar. I have also not gained weight since introducing it into my diet.

I’m still cautious as we need to see more research on humans. But I feel safe knowing that it has been used in traditional Chinese medicine for over 300 years as a low-calorie sweetener for diabetics, lung congestion, and soar throats. The animal studies I’ve seen are promising! Monk fruit has been found to have anti-tumor, anti-diabetic, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant properties. As seen in the following studies:

Using sucrose for recipes is antiquated at this point! I love this brand @Lakanto for my monk fruit choice. It also uses the polyol Erythritol which has been shown to be beneficial for the oral microbiome. It’s a no-brainer at this point to use products like Lakanto as it can literally be picked up at Walmart or on Amazon here (please note that as an Amazon Affiliate, I will earn a small commission at no additional cost to you if you chose to purchase through my link).

Let me know if you’ve tried this product in the comments and what your thoughts are!