I ordered online Stevia seeds that came with a book on the subject. Started my seeds indoors around the start of April and about half of them survived the transplanting and the attack of the squirrels. But now, they are getting close to being harvested. I read in my book that the best time to pick the leaves is right before and during the blossoming of the flowers. You can either eat the leaves right off the vine, or dry them for use in teas or making a powdered sweetener. Here's a picture of one of my Stevia plants...
Stevia is 300 times sweeter than granular sugar, so you don’t need to use much. I got two kinds of Stevia extract. One was in a liquid form that uses an eye dropper to dispense it into my coffee. The other is the white powder. I have the powder at work and like the taste of the Stevia. I got the powder back in February and still have the 1 ounce container at work.
I took some pictures of my Stevia plants to share with you and maybe by me posting about the great benefits of using this sugar substitute will convince others to try it.
The Stevia story is an interesting one. It is full of drama and even FDA raids on stores selling the product. The FDA outlawed Stevia when the big sugar industry protested to the FDA about Stevia and then two years later, it relented some by allowing health food stores to sell it as a supplement.
ReplyDeleteIt is typical of our government to outlaw something that is beneficial for everyone. Special interests rule the day and that is the case with Stevia. Japan has really embraced Stevia and over half their soft drinks now use Stevia as the sweetener. IN fact half the sweetener consumptions in Japan uses Stevia. South American countries also use it a lot.
Here's the health benefits of Stevia...
HEALTH BENEFITS OF STEVIA
The herb, Stevia rebaudiana, has been used for centuries by the Guarani Indians of Paraguay, who had several names for the plant, several of which are Kaa'-he-E, Caa'-ehe, or Ca-a-yupe- all. referring to the sweet leaf or honey leaf. It is commonly known in South America as yerba dulce meaning sweet herb. The Guarani used stevia nutritionally and medicinally.
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http://reid_j.tripod.com/stevia.htm
It is so hypocritical of the FDA to support a sugar substitute that actually promotes cancer, but ban a natural sweetener as unhealthy. This must be the Bizarro world as the FDA is more into representing a big sugar substitute industry than doing what's right for the consumer.
ReplyDeleteHere's another article about the FDA fight against Stevia...
http://www.naturalnews.com/023728_stevia_DNA_the_FDA.html
It seems as if the FDA is more for supporting businesses that give them money than supporting your health. It has gone on campaigns to prevent the healthy stevia sugar replacement to be available to everyone, including being used in diet soft drinks. Instead, it has gone on record in support for aspartame, which is proven to cause cancer and other health problems. This is from an email that I recently got warning about aspartame...
ReplyDeleteDear Ms. Oshita:
In reading available information, I assume you want mostly how aspartame relates to cancer. Indeed it is a carcinogen, proven so by many scientific studies. Aspartame also triggers many other serious diseases which fill the 1,000+ page medical text, Aspartame Disease: An Ignored Epidemic,
http://www.sunsentpress.com
by H. J. Roberts, M.D.
When FDA Commissioner Dr. Von Eschenbach took office I wrote him about aspartame and cancer, mainly due to his professed intention to save cancer victims; so much of this has already been done.
http://www.mpwhi.com/project_recall_aspartame.htm
Later 12 toxicologists asked the FDA to ban aspartame because of the long term Ramazzini studies on large rat populations showing aspartame is "a multipotential carcinogen".
http://www.cspinet.org/new/pdf/aspartame_letter_to_fda.pdfhttp://www.cspinet.org/new/pdf/aspartame_letter_to_fda.pdf
President Reagan had told Rumsfeld he would be nominated for vice president, but instead selected Bush number 1. The day after Reagan took office he appointed Dr. Arthur Hull Hayes as the new FDA Commissioner, to over-rule the Board of Inquiry. Reagan knew it would take 30 days to get Hayes to the FDA , so he wrote an Executive Order making the FDA powerless to do anything about aspartame. At 3 AM that night a member of Reagan's staff called the FDA Commissioner Jere Goyan and fired him. Here is a letter from his wife who was there when the terminating call came in:
http://www.mpwhi.com/letter_about_jere_goyan.pdf
Once aspartame was on the market there was outrage as consumers were diagnosed with seizures, multiple sclerosis and blindness from the free methyl alcohol releases. Senator Orrin Hatch, on Monsanto's payroll, obstructed hearings on aspartame for years, but there were 3 Congressional hearings from 1985 to l987. Hatch was on Monsanto's payroll, and kept the bill in committee that would put a moratorium on aspartame until NIH completed independent studies on the flood of aspartame problems they were seeing: seizures, blindness, headaches, sexual dysfunction, behavioral problems, especially in children, drug interactions and birth defects. About that time Dr. James Bowen wrote FDA that "aspartame is mass poisoning of the American public and 70 countries" - today over 100.
http://www.dorway.com/drbowen.txt
Here's another article that shows the FDA's fight FOR aspartame, a proven cancer-causing agent, and AGAINST Stevia, a naturally grown herb that has been used safely for thousands of year. Stevia is now the main sweetner for most countries in their diet soft drinks, instead of aspartame. But in America, the FDA is still banning it as if it were actually aspartame, which is the really bad sugar substitute, not Stevia.
ReplyDeleteStrong-arming an innocent herb
by Linda and Bill Bonvie
IN THEIR REVEALING BOOK Toxic Sludge is Good for You, authors John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton chronicle the ways in which corporate propagandists pose as consumer advocates or hijack grassroots organizations to further the agendas of various industries.
The most recent example of such flagrant misrepresentation can be found in the type of disinformation now emanating from the Center for Science in the Public Interest, often referred to as the "food police."
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http://www.stevia-plant.com/strongarming.cfm