Aside from the claim of "Zero calories!", which may or may not be considered a benefit, Splenda can not be considered to be "health food." The popular artificial sweetener is just that: artificial. This week, however, the FDA decided that some foods that use Splenda can claim limited health benefits because of the fact that they contain the sweetener. Following a request from the McNeil Nutritionals, which manufactures Splenda , the FDA is allowing products made with Splenda to state that they do not promote tooth decay. The claim cannot be made for the sweetener alone. Companies that wish to make use of the health claim must use the following wording: Frequent eating of foods high in sugars and starches as between-meal snacks can promote tooth decay. Sucralose, the sweetening ingredient used to sweeten this food, unlike sugars, does not promote tooth decay.

Last year, retail giant Wal-Mart pulled Splenda brand products from its shelves and began to test market a product called Altern. Altern is Wal-Mart's own brand of the artificial sweetener sucralose. According to CNN, a spokesperson for Wal-Mart revealed that the company is planning to have all of its supercenters fully stocked with Altern by the end of this month, while a spokesperson from Tate & Lyle, the company that distributes Splenda, issued a statement assuring investors that this new product would have no effect on its own sucralose division.

Despite the T&L assurance, it seems likely that Splenda would experience some drop off in direct-to-consumer sales as Wal-Mart replaces its products. Altern's release should not have an effect on the use of Splenda by food and drink manufacturers, however.

My lemonade taste test generated a flurry of responses. It seems that quite a few people have opinions about the sugar derived substitute and even though Splenda has been around for a while now, I don't think I'm the only one who never really used it at home. The lemonade worked out pretty well, with the Splenda tasting very good, even when compared to the sugar-sweetened version. One comment on my previous post suggested that sweetening plain yogurt might be a more interesting way to use the sweetener.

Did you know that Splenda is 600 times sweeter than sugar? I didn't and probably put a bit too much Splenda into that batch of yogurt. At least, I think I put too much Splenda in. Though the artificially sweetened yogurt wasn't unpleasant, the taste of sweetness overwhelmed the actual flavor of the yogurt, reminding me almost exactly of commercially sweetened products. The yogurt sweetened with sugar was sweet, but the sweetness enhanced the tang and flavor of my yogurt, rather than masking it. I would use Splenda again, but would be very conservative in how much I used so the flavor wouldn't compete with the yogurt. In this round of Splenda vs. sugar, though, sugar definitely comes out ahead.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

I'm already thinking about this month's Sugar High Friday: Low Sugar Edition. I like the challenge of coming up with recipes to fit a theme. But low sugar? I'll cut back on fat in a heartbeat, but I have to say that I would be hard pressed to give up sugar for any length of time unless I absolutely had to. Of course, one dessert does not a commitment make. Nevertheless, I wanted to know what I was up against, so I devised a little taste test with some fresh lemonade.

Let me first say that this was not scientific at all. It was not a blind taste test; I simply made two batches of lemonade and sweetened one with Splenda brand sweetener and one with sugar. Both batches tasted very good. The one with regular sugar tasted a little more complex, with the sugar having an obvious presence. The Splenda sweetened lemonade tasted a little brighter and more tart - it was difficult to measure how much I wanted to add from those little packets - but not artificial at all. The sugar version might have tasted a little bit more homemade, but the Splenda batch was very good, as well.

As far as ability to sweeten lemonade, I declared the test between Splenda and sugar a tie. Then I enjoyed the rest of my experiment with a bowl of chips on the side.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]