Foods That Can Be Used As Sweeteners

So you’ve been a good boy or girl, and tried to clean up your diet by eliminating sugar. It’s great, good for you. But if you’re struggling chugging those green smoothies or eating your healthy breakfast without anything sweet, here are some foods that can be used as sweeteners instead of sugar or artificial substitutes.

Foods That Can Sweeten Your Diet

Banana

I only sweeten my oatmeal or cottage cheese with a banana. Nothing else. When you significantly cut down sugar from your diet even a banana can seem almost a bit too sweet. Add them to green smoothies, freeze them to make ice cream, add to pancake batter instead of sugar, and make any dessert sweeter with half a banana.

Dates

Dates are very sweet and are also high in calories, but one or one and a half Medjool dates will sweeten you smoothie at just 100 calories as well as provide with such micronutrients as potassium, zinc, folate, vitamin A, vitamin K, and many others. Use them in brownies instead of eggs and sugar.

Carrots

Carrots aren’t as sweet as bananas or dates, but these can surely make great sweetener for dessert-y patties, famous cakes, and pudding. Carrots also go well with meat, fish, and rice enhancing the flavor of any dish.

Pumpkin

Pumpkins and carrots are similar in taste. Use them to make all sorts of desserts, as this sweet vegetable can be pureed as well as formed to create anything from a pudding to cheesecake.

Raw Honey

Though honey is high in fructose it also contains antioxidants, friendly bacteria, and micronutrients like Vitamin B6, riboflavin, calcium, iron, potassium, and many others. The nutritional benefits of this natural sweetener (provided it is truly unprocessed, organic, and raw) are simply too great to pass up.