Dr. Oz: Sugar Substitute Bake-Off, Liquid Stevia & Coconut Palm Sugar

Dr. Oz: Sugar Substitute Bake-Off

Dr. Oz asked some baking professionals to bake some delicious treats with Dr. Oz’s sugar substitutes. He had some people from the audience judging the treats. The three women chosen wore blindfolds and headphones. They couldn’t see or hear anything, so sometimes they talked during the segment out of turn. They didn’t know the treats were made with sugar substitutes.

Dr. Oz: Date Sugar

The first sugar substitute was date sugar. Michelle was the expert from the Whipped Pastry Boutique, who made cinnamon buns with date sugar. She said the date sugar worked quite nicely, however date sugar doesn’t melt the way sugar does, so there were no nice glaze like you get from sugar in a cinnamon bun. Michelle’s buns were gluten- and dairy-free as well.

Michelle said she used less date sugar than sugar in her recipe. A cup of white sugar equaled 3/4 cup of date sugar. Dr. Oz said he liked date sugar because it was full of antioxidants and potassium.

Dr. Oz: Coconut Palm Sugar

The next sugar substitute was coconut palm sugar, used by Patricia from Sweet Corner. She made a ginger molasses cookie with the coconut palm sugar. She said at first, she was skeptical of using coconut palm sugar, but she liked it after all. She used a ratio of 1:1 to substitute and she said the flavor came out great.

Coconut palm sugar doesn’t cause the same blood sugar spike as regular sugar, so there’s no crash.

Dr. Oz: Liquid Stevia

Then Dr. Oz talked to Athena from the Milk & Cookies Bakery, who used liquid stevia in her coconut almond brownies. She said the best part was that two teaspoons of liquid stevia replaced a whole cup of sugar. That’s the formal ratio, but Athena cut it back to 1 teaspoon. Stevia is sweeter than sugar and there’s no blood sugar spike.

Ultimately, two of the judges table voted for the brownies and the liquid stevia and one person at the table chose the cookies and the coconut palm sugar. The judges were all shocked that there was no sugar in the treats.