6

noob here (both to this site and to cooking in general!). For health reasons I can't really do sugar, and the low-carb thing has saved my life (literally). I am trying to do more low-carb baking at home. The topic of non-sugar sweeteners have been discussed at length (pros/cons, how to substitute, etc). I have used stevia at low temperatures to great success (making home-made drinks, chocolates, gummies, etc).

However, when I try baking with stevia, monk fruit, and/or erithyrol, the batter/dough tastes very sweet, but after baking I cannot taste the sweetness at all.

It's important to note that, unlike other questions, I already (a) can taste the sweetness in these alternative sweeteners (no genetic issue, and I'm okay with aftertastes), (b) have used and enjoyed these sweeteners at low-temperatures, and (c) the sweetness seems to disappear during baking regardless of the sweetener used.

I have already tried:

  • changing the sweetener and mixed sweeteners together (swapping stevia for monk-fruit, mixing them together, etc). Stevia, for example, claims to be heat-stable, and others have claimed success when baking with stevia.
  • changed recipies (cookies, cakes, breads, brownies, etc) and quantities (more sweetener, less; more baking soda/powder, less, etc)
  • changing temperature and cook time

Given (a) that sweeteners like stevia claim to be heat-stable, (b)others seem to have success when baking with them, and (c) I've used these sweeteners with success at low-temps, what could be causing the loss of sweetness during the baking process? Are there any known interactions with, say, vinegar or baking powder that would change the sweeteners during cook-time?

NSGod
  • 1,129
  • 7
  • 10
cegfault
  • 213
  • 2
  • 6
  • I'm fundamentally confused. How do you do baking and still be low carbohydrate? Flour and corn meal are basically just carbohydrates. Sugar is 100% carb by weight and white flour 75%. – MaxW Feb 11 '19 at 01:00
  • 1
    @MaxW don't use flour, corn meal, or sugar. Protein powders and almond flour are substitutes (in varying degrees) to flour, and non-nutritive sweeteners instead of sugar. A search for [Keto Baking](https://www.startpage.com/do/dsearch?query=keto+baking&cat=web&pl=opensearch&language=english) will help you. – cegfault Feb 11 '19 at 01:10
  • Also, yes, it's a challenge, and yes, swapping out flour and sugar changes taste and makes baking difficult, but after going eight months with literally zero baked goods, I'll take a sugar-free, flourless brownie over nothing :) – cegfault Feb 11 '19 at 01:11
  • 2
    @MaxW brownies in particular are very adaptable. They're a good gluten free option if catering for coeliacs. There are also meringues (some don't have much sugar and we had a question recently) and various things based on coconut (coconut pyramids and macaroons which can also be based on other nuts) – Chris H Feb 11 '19 at 07:29
  • 1
    I have no experience with this, but you might try making a 'syrup' (sweetened liquid) in this case, and adding it to the item *after* it's been baked. Like a glaze on a cookie or stabbing holes in and drizzling it over a cake. – Joe Mar 11 '19 at 15:56
  • @MaxW: we use many alternative grains, as I answered here: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/99301/54812 – NSGod Jun 09 '19 at 22:29
  • When you say baking w/ stevia do you mean the pure stevia powder (super concentrated sweetness), or stevia bulked with maltodextrin (Stevia in the Raw), or liquid stevia? I do a lot of low-carb baking myself (using mostly Splenda, though have started with Stevia in the Raw) and will say that batters frequently seem much sweeter to me than the end result, which always puzzled me... – NSGod Jul 14 '19 at 19:36
  • 1
    @NSGod pure stevia powder (mostly) or liquid (occasionally). maltodextrin is a high-GI carbohydrate. It spikes blood glucose *more* than regular sugar, and has the same calories. Another common bulk ingredient is dextrose - literally table sugar. In low-carb / keto baking, I'm trying to *avoid* carbs and am choosing *low-GI* foods. Maltodextrin is probably the worst choice, but seeing how it's a high-GI carb, that would make sense it bakes well and preserves sweetness – cegfault Jul 22 '19 at 20:59
  • @cegfault: Sigh. I'm sorry you've taken that stance. First, dextrose is only used in the packets. Second, one problem w/ GI is that it doesn't take into account quantities (hence rise of Glycemic Load as an alternative). (Dose makes the poison). The amount of maltodextrin actually consumed in a typical serving of stevia/maltodextrin blend is tiny: 1.5 g for 1 Tbsp of blend which has negligible effect on blood sugar. Maltodextrin has little taste at all, it's merely a bulking agent. – NSGod Jul 22 '19 at 21:26
  • @NSGod "1.5g for 1 TBsp of blend which has negligible effect on blood sugar" - for people like me with serious health issues, that's more than enough to cause catastrophic effects on my intestines (literally send me to the hospital). I don't get nit-picky about 1.5g because it's fun, I do it because it's necessary. Every milligram counts. – cegfault Jul 30 '19 at 15:17
  • I'm confused why it would affect your intestines, but I'll have to live with that mystery. I'm genuinely curious, but this is getting off-topic for this site and we should refrain from discussing this particular aspect any further. Returning to the question at hand, have you tried pure sucralose powder at all? Also you might look into allulose and see if that works for you. Can you edit your question to clarify what exact sweeteners you've used (for example, "pure stevia powder", "pure monkfruit powder", etc.)? – NSGod Jul 30 '19 at 18:19
  • sugar-based alternatives okay-ish in very tiny doses, but no-go for baking. That is, 1/8 tsp allulose is okay, but 1/8 cup is not. Allulose is (almost literally) sugar but doesn't absorb or metabolize the same. The best really are the non-sugars (stevia and monkfruit), and next-best sugar alcohols (xylitol, etc). I purposely left the question vague as (a) it seems to be a property of all non-sugar sweeteners (in my experience), and (b) I've tried just about everything - as powders, liquids, mixes of them. I want to avoid anything sugar (even sucralose/allulose/dextrose/etc. – cegfault Jul 31 '19 at 13:33

1 Answers1

5

I hate answering my own question, but after a month I did (finally) find a pseudo-answer that works for Stevia. I've not yet tried it for any other sweeteners.

Melt into fat and freeze it

For example, the recipe I use for cookies needs four (4) tablespoons of melted butter. I started by melting two tablespoons in butter (well, 1TB butter and 1TB cocoa butter but semantics aside...), and mixed half a tablespoon of stevia into the melted butter.

Then I poured the Stevia-butter mix into molds and froze until it was solid.

I proceeded with the rest of the recipe as normal, but after everything was mixed, I took the frozen Stevia-butter, chopped it into very tiny shavings/pieces, and mixed it into the batter.

Poured the cookies on the tray, and baked in the oven. Result: nice, sweet, almost zero carb (~0.05g) cookies!!!

My working theory

I'm not confident in my theory, but I think the fats - especially saturated fats - will protect the Stevia early during the baking process. Couple that with Newton's law of cooling (ie, although the batter is at room temperature the sweetener is at sub-freezing temps, and will therefore take longer to heat up than the rest of the batter). While the batter cooks as normal, the fats will melt into the batter, revealing and mixing the sweetener with it. This minimizes the time the sweetener is exposed to the full-force heat of the oven, which prevents it from degrading under heat.

This may not be the best process for fluffy or flaky goods like breads, but for dense, sweet goods like cookies, muffins, brownies, etc, it works well.

Yet again, that's just a working theory....

cegfault
  • 213
  • 2
  • 6