My no added sugar quest

A major sweet tooth. That’s what I have. I could eat anything sweet any time of day. And that is a problem, especially since I have not been able to hit the gym as much as I’d like due to my current work situation. I already wanted to start this no added sugar ‘detox’ a month ago, but because my life was starting back up and I was trying to do everything at once, that wasn’t working out too well. So I’ve decided to start back up again. From last Monday onwards until I go on vacation in a few weeks time, I will refrain from eating anything that isn’t naturally sweetened.

Source: weheartit.com

But what does that mean ‘naturally sweetened’? By that I mean anything that contains sugar(s) naturally. So if a product contains any added sugars, such as sugar, sucrose, fructose, glucose, dextrose, corn syrup or any equivalent I will not eat it. Naturally sweetened products are mostly produce that are sweet on its own accord. All fruits and vegetables such as carrots and tomatoes are naturally sweet and thus that is pretty much all I’m allowed to eat to get my sweet kick.

The reason why I’m not doing a full sugar detox is that I just know that eating no sugar at all will simply not work for me. I’m a sugar addict (true story) and to get that out of my system I know that it would be best to stop using it all together. However, with my busy schedule and ‘being in my head’ all day, I simply need it to function. Your brain runs mainly on sugar so I need to feed it that thing it needs in order for it to function properly and enable me to do my job.

So here’s what I’m skipping:

• Any candy, chocolate, baked goods and the like.
• Anything including added sugar. This eliminates all flavored yoghurts, most store bought sushi, any of my favorite drinks from Starbucks (le sigh), and pretty much anything prepackaged
• As little dairy/ lactose as possible. Lactose is a type of sugar (notice the -ose ending of the word). So apart from my weekday portion of Greek yoghurt, I am going for dairy free/ lactose free options.
• No added honey or agave nectar in my smoothies or yoghurt. Even though these are natural, they aren’t the best for you either as both honey and agave nectar are sweeter than actual sugar.

Here’s what I’m sticking to:

• All fresh fruits, but I am limiting my portions: no more fresh fruit in my morning yoghurt.
• Dried berries and fruits. As long as they don’t have any added sugars, I can use these as snacks for that little sweet kick. Dried apricots, dates, cranberries and goji berries are on the list, but I’m trying to stay away from raisins.
• ‘Sweet veggies’: sweet potato, tomatoes, carrots, beets. These are some of my favorites (together with broccoli, green beans, brussels sprouts and cauliflower).
• I’ve been getting into (hard) goat’s cheese a lot lately. I find it works really well in salads, but is also delicious to munch on as a snack.

Of course I am still going strong on whole semi low carb/ wheat free/ paleo/ sometimes pescatarian, sometimes vegetarian and sometimes vegan diet I’ve been sticking to for the past 2 years. I’m only eating gluten & wheat free bread, no more than 2 – 3 times a week. For dinner I have not been needing much food as I have no time to eat lunch so I snack away during the day on my fruit and veggies and have lunch when I’m on the train home. I then only need something small so cooking is something that is set a on the back burner a bit. I do make sure to get all the fuel I need though, so don’t worry about that.

I’m now 3 days in, and so far so good. But it’s only been 3 days. So let’s see if I can keep this up.