Baking recipes tend to use medium and high amounts of sugar, which people suffering from diabetes can't use. So, is that to say they cannot make and eat these delicious desserts? Of course they can! You just need to know the equivalence of sugar and sweetener so you can replace it. If you are diabetic or if you would simply prefer to exchange an item for another to follow a healthier diet, this OneHowTo article explains how to replace sugar with sweetener.
While both sugar and sweetener sweeten foods in the same way, but sweetener is sweeter than sugar, so we have to use less. This is the first rule you must learn to replace sugar for sweetener. So if the recipe you're making tells you that you need 200g of sugar, you cannot put the same amount of sweetener because it will come out way too sweet.
There are a multitude of artificial sweeteners on the market, including aspartame, cyclamate and saccharin, but only the latter is used for baking and can withstand high temperatures. Similarly, they are sold in powder, liquid or pills.
Equivalence between sugar and powdered sweetener
Normally, this is the most common sweetener with recipes for cakes, cupcakes and products that require an oven or microwave. The equivalence is simple, 10 grams of sugar equivalent to 1 gram of a sweetener. Thus, to calculate the amount of sweetener you just have to divide the grams of sugar by 10. For example, if the recipe calls for 250g sugar we divide it by 10 and so replace it with 25g of sweetener.
Equivalence between sugar and sweetener tablets
The tablets contain more concentratedamount of sweetener than the other types. Thus, the formula for calculating the number of pills is the same as above (divided by 10) but, in this case, multiply the result by 2. Following the same example, 250g of sugar divided by 10 and multiplied by 2 would give us 50 pills.
Equivalence between sugar and liquid sweetener
Liquid sweetener weighs about the same as powdered sweetener, but when looking for a result in millilitres and not in grams, the number varies slightly. Divide the total number of grams of sugar specified in the recipe by 12.5, the result will be the liquid sweetener in ml. So, 250g of sugar divided by 12.5 gives us 20ml of sweetener.
Now that you know the equivalences between sugar and sweetener you can prepare any recipe without problems. You can also replace sugar with stevia, which is an all natural, plant based sugar substitute. To know the propertes of stevia, follow this link to the article.
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