Stevia VS Truvia

I think stevia is great. I’ve been using it for about 7 years now. I also use Truvia sometimes as well, but they are NOT the same thing. I’ve been seeing some statements about Truvia on the boards that are not exactly accurate. Cargill’s advertising, pertaining to Truvia, is kind of misleading. As far as it being a “natural” sweetener, I think Cargill is allowed to call Truvia natural for the same reasons pizza is now a vegetable, because it meets some minimal government requirements. How you feel about this depends upon what your intentions are regarding your food. So, for people who aren’t familiar with stevia, or who think that Truvia is an “all natural” sweetener, or even primarily stevia, I wanted to post some general information.

Green Leaf Stevia Powder:
Stevia is a South American shrubby herb that is grown for its sweet tasting leaves. The leaves are green. So in it’s purest form, stevia leaf powder will be green. Made from the whole leaves of the stevia herb, the leaves are collected, dried and milled into a fine powder at low temperatures to protect the nutrients of the plant. If you are very particular about natural food in your diet and want things as close to the way they came out of the ground as possible, this is the variety of stevia powder that you would probably want.

White Stevia Powder:
Similar to the way that white sugar is a processed version of sugar cane, white stevia powder is a processed version of the stevia leaf. It is a chemically processed powder that has been removed from the stevia leaf, just like white sugar is just the very sweet sucrose removed from sugar cane or sugar beets. The sweet chemical extract is a glyoside called stevioside. Stevia leaf plants contain about a 10% concentration of stevioside. Most white powders contain an extract that is up to 80-90% steviocide. Science “improving” on nature. Also many of the white stevia powders use large amounts of maltodextrin to cut the strong sweet flavor of the stevia extract. Maltodextrin is usually derived from GMO feed corn, using chemicals, bleaching agents and other very-unnatural processes. So if you are looking for a no calorie sweetener, more natural than Splenda or saccharine, but aren’t particularly into the whole unprocessed concern, then you may prefer white stevia powder over green leaf powder.

Truvia:
Truvia is actually a combination of erythritol (the primary ingredient, hence first on the ingredient list on the label) and rebiana. It looks and tastes more like sugar, sort of. Which is probably because it is primarily made from a sugar alcohol.
Erythritol, the primary ingredient in Truvia is a sugar alcohol, normally made from glucose that is created from corn or wheat starch. To do this, the starch is first treated with enzymes (special proteins) that break the starch down into glucose. This glucose is then mixed with yeast, such as Moniliella pollinis or Trichosporonoides megachliensis, and the yeast ferments the glucose to form erythritol. The fermented mixture is then heated (in order to kill off the yeast) an dried (by boiling off all the water) so that erythritol crystals are formed. These crystals are then washed (to remove impurities), redissolved, purified again (using a special kind of chemical filter) and finally are isolated in solid form, at which point the erythritol is safe for human consumption.
Rebiana, also known as Reb-A is purified extract of stevia, developed by Japanese scientists back in 1971. Although developed by scientists, it passes whatever qualifications have been established, so rebiana products are allowed to use the “natural” label.
Like I said, I use it sometimes, but it’s NOT the pure and natural sweetener they claim it is and it’s not exactly stevia since the erythritol outweighs the stevia in the makeup.

I hope this was helpful to some of you. It is information I keep in mind when deciding on a particular sweetener at a particular time.