The FastDay Forum

I'm on the other side of the fence. I haven't had sugar/sweeteners in hot drinks since I was a teenager which was a long time ago.I also don't drink fizzy drinks ( except tonic, slimline, in my gin) However I do like things like custard and porridge and cereal to taste sweet. I also find adding some no added sugar squash to water makes it more palatable on fasting days. I believe that sweeteners are better that the white devil that is refined sugar. I don't really get on with stevia and try and stick to sucralose. This is also relatively natural - the molecule is the same as sucrose but with some added chlorine atoms that mean we don't absorb/metabolise it.

@Amo107 Eek, that's scary. It's not good for you at all! I know all the evidence is inconclusive, but I'd rather eat natural products than risk it.

I won't let my children touch aspartame - I won't have no added sugar squash in the house, for instance, I'd rather they have weak added sugar squash, water, or milk. I check the labels of absolutely everything they eat, and we try to eat as cleanly as we can.

I found aspartame in tonic water the other day. Gutted! No G&T for me that evening.

I'm with you with butter as well. I also much prefer the way butter melts into toast, whereas I find margarine makes it go soggy.

In terms of sugar, I just buy demerara sugar for every day use, it's not quite as refined as white sugar, and tastes nicer.

@imcountingufoz *high fives* right back at you hun. @Amo107 I'm with you on the plastic margarine too, why buy plastic spread when you can have lovely tasting butter? These things shouldn't even be on the market.

Ditch it all. Go cold turkey. After about 4 weeks you stop craving it and your addiction is gone!
The thought of sugary water is pretty horrible to me now.
realize that this isn't a helpful answer for the original post, but ditching sugared drinks makes the other aspects of 5:2 much easier and certainly helped me crave more nutritious foods.

For me it's a matter of taste - not addiction. I have the smell of artificial stuff, but I can't have a cup of coffee or tea without the tiniest amount of sugar/honey. And - I use some raw suger in most cooking to balance the taste. We are not talking tsp here, but less and it makes a difference in many dishes. Even the Hairy ones uses it

imcountingufoz we are so on the same wavelength re children/squash/clean eating etc.

I use stevia in all my coffee's now , tastes fine . I use the equal brand all the other brand's of stevia I found wouldn't disolve properly and at the bottom of the cup you would have undesolved sweetener left [ yuck ]. I used to use the normal equal sweetener until reading all the negatives about it. I am still on the fence though about that. I kind of think they can't be that dangerous or they wouldn't be able to sell them so easily. You can easily find information saying they are safe if you look for it. But for now I will stick to stevia.

The stevia I use is liquid. You just squirt it into coffee or whatever. I drink a lot of iced coffee these days, so it's handy. I've also used truvia , a brand name for stevia in the US that you find in restaurants and coffee shops. It's a powder.