Dried Stevia Leaf Powder Nutritional Information

The stevia plant is native to Brazil, but now cultivated in various world regions. Approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2008, the powder produced from stevia leaves is 200 times sweeter than table sugar from sugar cane, according to the International Food Information Council Foundation. The product that stevia producers extract and dry for consumer use is steviol glycosides. The amount commonly consumed when you use stevia as a sweetener is much less than the equivalent in sugar. Although stevia is a no-calorie sweetener in single serving sizes, in larger larger amounts, stevia provides minerals and amino acids.

Significance

Single-serving stevia packets contain less than 1 tsp. Food manufacturers also add it to baked goods, beverages, chewing gum and confections, in small amounts per item. Food packaging laws do not require that manufacturers list the amount of certain nutrients below a specific amount per serving. This applies to foods that contain less than 5 calories and those that contain less than 1 g of protein, carbohydrates or fiber per serving.

Macronutrients

One standard packet of stevia contains 1 g of powder. My Fitness Pal shows that the only nutrient it contains is 1 g of sugars. Egyptian researchers conducted nutrient assays on 100 g samples of stevia powder and published their results in the May 2010 "African Journal of Food Science." This amount is equal to 3.5 oz. in dry weight. They found that a 100 g sample of powdered stevia is 62 percent carbohydrate, 16 percent fiber and 11 percent protein.

Minerals

A 100 g sample of stevia powder contained 21 mg of potassium, 18 mg of calcium, 15 mg of sodium and 6 mg of iron per 100 g. It also contained 3 mg of manganese, 3 mg of magnesium and 1 mg of zinc, along with 0.73 mg of copper. If you consumed 100 g of stevia in a day, it would provide 150 percent of the DV for manganese in a 2,000-calorie diet, 37 percent of the DV for copper, 33 percent of the DV for iron and 7 percent of the DV for zinc. For the other minerals identified, the amounts fall below 5 percent of the daily value, making stevia a low source of those nutrients.

Amino Acids

The 100 g stevia sample contained at least 1 g each of four essential amino acids -- histidine, leucine, methionine and therionine. With the exception of isolucine at 0.42 g and arginine at 0.45 g, stevia powder's content was greater than 0.5 g for the remaining essential amino acids. It also contained 1 g of tyrosine and small amounts of seven other nonessential amino acids.