Sugar free options?

[nachoqtpie]

Hey everybody!

I'm looking for sugar free options for jams, jellies, and sauces (mostly spaghetti sauce).

Thanks!

 

[XtreemLee]

I have never, and would never sweeten a spaghetti sauce, sweetening became a trends when folks switched to tomato paste (and added water) instead of using fresh tomatoes (after ww2), tomato paste is bitter and you can try to hide that with sugar. Good tomatoes, gentle cooking and basil and onion, bell pepper, celery add plenty of sweetness in my opinion. If you really want to turn your sauce up a notch and sweeten it, add grated carrots and beets.
The only sweetener I have in the house is local raw honey...

 

[Fae]

I actually just tried making some raspberry jam with splenda instead of sugar... sucralose, to be exact. Used slightly underripe berries so they'd have a bit more pectin to help it thicken up a bit. I'll update with the morning if it set or not.

 

[XtreemLee]

Okay, but this is a traditional rustic marinara, and it won't take hours.

Ingredients - serves two to three (this happens to be a gluten free/vegan dish also, but most traditional marinara's are)
6 Tomatoes
4 Cloves garlic
1 Onion
1 Cup or Top 2 inches of a bunch of celery (about 1 cup)
1/2 Green or Bell Pepper
1 Package Fresh Basil or 20 to 30 leaves
2 Tablespoons Coconut Oil

Sea Salt 2-3 teaspoons
Black Pepper 1-2 teaspoons

I always bruise my garlic and let it sit for 10-15 minutes before slicing and adding to warm coconut oil. By bruising the garlic and letting it sit it develops wonderful enzymes and sweetness. It also makes it easy to remove the skin. Just use the flat of a knife and smash the bulb a bit. Then peel and slice thin (I go for 1/8 inch or 2mm slices), then gently heat at medium-low, or lower, you do not want boiling just a gentle sweat. This is one of the tricks of a gourmet, garlic is sensitive to heat, just gently sweat it till opaque if you brown it you killed it and the oil, toss it and do it again...

While the garlic is sweating dice the onion and add to the pan, be gentle with those but they can be added shortly after or with the garlic, sweating these to opaque will take five to ten minutes. I usually add the onion soon after the garlic, I just keep cutting and adding, celery next. Gentle sweating of both the garlic and onion will mildly caramelize and add natural sweetness, you can't duplicate that with sugar.

Take a bunch of celery and slice down through the leafy tops, looking for a thin slice about 1/8 inch (2 mms), this keeps the leaves small and they are critical to flavor, if you don't use celery tops it isn't rustic or traditional. I use the first two inches about 1 cup.

Green pepper, dice to 1/4 inch (5 mm) and add to pan. *Note: I am a minimalist/pragmatist and I use all of the edible vegetable (that means the brown dried tips of the celery went into the pan), a tip for those who want to capture true flavor, eat the core of the green pepper. The best way to attack a green pepper is to slice off the top in a way to sever the woody stem from the core, then take a spoon or a fingernail and scrape the seeds from the core, once you pull it out. Once the core is de-seeded then dice to 1/8 inch pieces and add to pan, I waste no pepper pith either, dice it and chuck it in...

To de-seed the tomatoes you cut them in half on the equator, then squeeze them forcing the seeds and water out. One tomato should take 20-30 seconds to de-seed. Do NOT skin, once de-seeded dice into 1/2 inch or 10mm cubes. Add to pan and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes.

Add Sea salt and pepper adjust to taste. (Salt is necessary to a human being continuing to function and blood pressure is not a real concern, it's a fake issue made up to sell you drugs and make you afraid, in Europe they have regimes to help increase blood pressure.)

Taste to add more salt and pepper as needed and add sliced basil. Basil I just bunch up and slice thin 1/8 inch (2 mm). Add to pan and cook another 10 minutes.

Now if you are wise you will skip possibly dangerous and nutritionally vacant pasta and use a head of cauliflower instead. How I prepare the cauliflower is fun, suffice to say I waste zero cauliflower, the leaves, stem and core all eat just fine. I just adjust the size to how much cooking time it will take. I put the cauliflower in a pan with three tablespoons coconut oil and sauté till tender crisp.

Then plate the cauliflower top with marinara and if they don't like it kick em out, and get some Mediterranean friends they will love you...

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Ask and ye shall receive!

I only tried it once and I forgot the part about heating it up to (edited to add - SIMMER ONLY) do not boil.


Homemade Stevia Extract

Print
Prep time
5 mins
Total time
5 mins
Author: Katie Wellness Mama
Recipe type: Tincture
Ingredients

• 1- Quart or pint glass jar with lid (both boiled to sterilize)
• fresh or dried stevia leaf
• enough vodka, rum or everclear to fill the jar (at least half of the total size of the jar)
• a cheesecloth or fine mesh strainer
• small sauce pan

Instructions

1. Put the fresh or dried stevia leaf in the jar, filling it ⅔ full.
2. Pour vodka/rum/everclear over the leaves to fill the jar and put the lid on tightly.
3. Put in a place where you will see it and leave for 36 hours, shaking occasionally. (I put on the counter and shake every time I'm cooking) Leaving it for longer than this seems to make it bitter.
4. Strain the liquid into the small sauce pan (it will be greenish-brown)
5. Turn heat on low and bring to a simmer. Important: do not boil! It will ruin the taste!!!
6. Simmer for about ½ an hour, stirring constantly and making sure not to boil. It will thicken. When it gets to your desired thickness, remove from heat.
7. Store in small jar in the fridge for up to 3 months.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

You can use Splenda and it works @rhoda_bruce? I was thinking of going with that but I didn't know if it would work or not. I have some delicious sounding jelly and jam recipes but didn't want to make them if the Splenda (or any other sugar sub) wouldn't work.

I know some people use sugar in their spaghetti sauce. I have only made it from scratch one time and nobody cared for it. *sigh* I worked for HOURS taking out the seeds, removing the skins... LOL I thought "This is going to be GREAT!" but alas it was not. :-( Got a sure fire recipe that I can try?

I never exactly got it in writing that it is officially safe to use, but I read it can be used, cup for cup, as a sugar would and I knew it was a 'diabetic sugar' so a few years back, I called a nurse I work with, who is very old school, really smart and also a diabetic and she informed me that one of her husband's uncles does that and the preserves are very good.
I would think that by now there would be lots on the internet about this very subject, which at the time, I couldn't find. Not sure how the fruits hold up with Splenda as its preservative, rather than actual sugar. It was my understanding that Splenda was made from sugar, but idk. That was way back and I have no sources. But everyone I gave my figs to are still alive.

 

[Sylvia H]

Try growing some stevia. It's wonderful and no artificial anything.

 

[wyoDreamer]

If you want to sweeten your spaghetti sauce just a little, add grated carrots at the start of cooking. They add a nice, natural sweetness and makes it even healthier too!

 

[Denim Deb]

Wonder how they'd taste in my coffee?

 

[Britesea]

You can use it for canning fruit very easily- but I think you would have to taste the syrup to get the sweetness you want. I haven't seen any charts giving amounts, and if you are growing your own - different plants provide different levels of sweetness.