no sucralose is NOT an SA. it is splenda without the fillers. i use it in cooking and baking and find that it is better than stevia in the sense that you can use more of it without fearing bitterness. however, with both sucralose and stevia, you need to dilute them first (in water) to make sure they disperse through your food since both are very concentrated powders which will make a small part very sweet and the rest not sweet if not infused well. hth!

www.mendosa.com/netcarbs

stevia is my personal favorite as it actually has health benefits to it (remember, it is just a leaf, no worries!). splenda, while not a sugar alcohol, is sugar that has been through a chlorine process. sounds a little scary, but the fda says it's safe; after all, have we not eaten sodium chloride for centuries? that's a topic for debate in itself.

sugar alcohol isn't actually the devil in disguise when used in moderate amounts. realize that up to 2/3 of it is the same as carbohydrates, but also know that eating a candy bar with a couple grams of sa is not going to impact you much. most of the atkins endulge products only contain about 8-10g per bar, and i personally only eat half at a time anyway. never has bothered me.

be warned of carborite. they are the ones with 60g sa per bag of certain candies...that's a bit much.

i just tried the muffins a couple of weeks ago for the first time and absolutely fell in love! i made the whole batch and put them in the freezer and take one out and nuke it when the mood hits.

Dont know if any of you like Sunflower seeds, I love em and KrispyKernels (a canadain brand) has only 4 grams of carbs per serving BUT also has 4 grams of fibre per serving,(basically they are a freebie) They come in BBQ flavor as well and the carbs are the same. They make a great "junk food" or are great added to salads, Note: they do contain hydogenated veg oil. but low levels. I've been eating them my whole 8 months doing LC and pounds are peeling off.

I agree. I buy Star Snacks brand Sunflower Kernels(Roasted) and the content weighs 7.25 ounces. 1 ounce is one serving, and total carbs is 5 grams with fiber being 4 grams. Therefore, 1 gram of net carbs per serving and 7 grams of net carbs in the whole container, that is awesome. I love these little seeds. Now that you tell me about flavored seeds, I will have to do some searching, thanks. On the downside, I purchased a lot of Atkins pancake mixes and La Tortilla Factory tortillas and they stall me. I have concluded that any flour will stall me. I now went back to induction with the addition of sunflower seeds. If anyone wants to purchase my Atkins pancake mixes(both kinds) or La Tortilla Factory tortillas, let me know. $1 to $1.50 for the pancake mixes and around $2 for the tortillas.

I have to say all of the Keto mixes I bought cost a fortune and ended up in the trash. A weird combination of glue and cardboard so maybe they were not trying to build food. I don't much like the taste of the carb countdown milks or juices, has a funny chemical aftertaste to me. I have discovered for the first time blue bunny products has anyone heard anything about them?
I have spent a ton of money on this or that product and most all of it ends up in the trash. I am not great at understanding the labels when it comes to fats and sugar alchols so all i have read was very helpful to me.
I also enjoyed the humor of all the trial and errors as i could relate to so many of them.
awesome thread, long and well worth the time.

thos damn atkins munchie chips....ewwwwwyy

they're going out of business anyways!

I wanted to put my $.02 in here. I used to post regularly on a SBD site, and the partially hydrogenated/hydrogenated oil topic came up often. Someone on that site did alot of research (and she really seemed to know her stuff on other things, so I trusted her on this). It seems that it's ONLY the PARTIALLY hydrogenated oils that contain the dreaded trans-fats. Oils that have been completely hydrogenated do NOT contain trans fat, and so are OK for Atkins (and other low carb diets). That's what was accepted on that site, and from what little I've read on other sites, it's true.

On this topic, too -- do you find it easier to just try to stick to "natural" foods and stay low carb, or is it easier to buy the "specialty" stuff, even if grossly overpriced? I'm just wondering. I know the food industries are only lookng to make a buck, and aren't all that concerned about the health benefits of their products (a blanket generalization, I know, but still mostly true). The few low carb products I've tried in the past were AWFUL, and now I'm afraid to spend my tightly budgeted $$ on them!

Thanks to all of you who critiqued those products, though! Now I know if I DO decide to try something, I can come here and see if someone else loved it or hated it!

Sue

I agree, this is an excellent thread.

For me, I don't make the frankenfoods part of my regular diet. However, if I am making tacos for the kids I will make sure there are lc tortillas for me. Sometimes I buy lc bread, if I have a craving, I grab a lc chocolate. To depend on that stuff is way out of my budget and I think real food tastes better, anyway.

The Lean Cuisine low carb Meals are tasty (well, good for frozen dinners that is), but they have transfats and sugar in them. And they're not that low carb...the sauce that covers the meat usually has sugar in it. Lean Cuisine just doens't get it.

I originally bought them to take to work--sometimes I didn't have the time to make lunch in the morning. I didn't lose any weight at all when I was eating these. I would have been better off buying a salad from Subway or McD's.

I have been eating the Special K Low Carb cereal, at first I didnt like it but I got used to it. I also tried the low carb milk made by Hood. It has a good flavor also. Some times I get so tired of eating bacon for breakfast and crave cereal. It this has oils in yet, is there any other we can eat?

I got one for you...

President's Choice chicken wings. They say there are ZERO carbs in the bag. If you read the ingredients, it says sugar TWICE. How does that work?

My sister got me some CarbWise Gold Carmel Peanut bars and they taste great! Unfortunately they seem to be labelled incorrectly. Says 3 net grams of carbs, but when you read the entire label it looks like it should be more like 7 grams. What gives?

sugar alcohols