Sucrose is the term used to refer to table sugar. Sucrose-free or sugar-free chocolate is often marketed to diabetics to help them satisfy their sweet tooth without impairing their blood sugar control. If you have diabetes and enjoy the taste of chocolate, you can include moderate servings of sugar-free chocolate in your diet, but they still contain carbohydrates and can influence your blood sugar levels if eaten in large amounts.
Sugar-free Chocolate
Sugar-free chocolates are sweetened with sugar alcohols, a family of sugar that provides less calories and less sugar compared to regular sweeteners. Sugar alcohols include all sugars with a name ending in -ol, such as sorbitol, maltitol, mannitol, erythritol, xylitol as well as the exception to the rule, isomalt. Sugar alcohols can raise your blood sugar levels but only about half as much as the same amount of sugar, which make them a popular choice for diabetics.
Carb Counting
With diabetes, counting your grams of carbs can help you maintain a constant carb intake at each meal and each day to help you optimize your blood sugar levels. If you eat sugar-free chocolate, look at the food label. Sugar-free chocolate is not totally carbohydrate-free and you need to take these carbs into consideration in your carb counting. Because sugar alcohols raise your blood sugar levels to a smaller extent, you can subtract half of the sugar alcohols from the total carbohydrates to include in your carb counting. For example, if your sugar-free chocolate bar has 20 g of total carbohydrates and 14 g of sugar alcohol, you can subtract half of the sugar alcohols, or 7 g, from the total carbs, which corresponds to a total of 13 g of available carbs. Count these 13 g of carbohydrates as part of your daily carb intake.
Laxative Effect
The sugar alcohol found in sugar-free chocolate can have a laxative effect if consumed in large amounts. Most people can tolerate up to 10 g of sugar alcohols at a time, but if you exceed this amount, you may experience diarrhea.
Dark Chocolate
Sugar-free chocolates are often more expensive when compared to regular chocolate. If you wish to enjoy chocolate while keeping your diabetes under control and without spending a fortune, opt for a good-quality dark chocolate. Dark chocolate with 70 percent cocoa or more contains little chocolate and is suitable for your diabetes diet. For example, two squares of 70 percent dark chocolate provides only 7 g of available carbohydrates.
