What is Splenda Anyway?

[Space05us]

I just got done arranging my apartment, putting away all of my w00tly new kitchen stuff, swept and mopped the floors, and called it good. I went over to my moms apartment because she has food over here (and the internet) and I dont have these things in my apartment just yet. Looked through the fridge and saw a big jug of Arizona ice tea, it looked perfect! Poured a nice tall cup, took a sip, wondered what the **** was wrong with it. It tasted like there was aspartame in it but not quite the same as usual. So I took another sip, strange taste. So I looked at the jug, it says its sweetend with Splenda. You know, the "no calorie sweetner that tastes like sugar because its made from sugar," that bull****. Tastes like ****, not like sugar.

What is splenda?

[MrFun]

You already explained what it is -- it's crap.

[Japher]

My father-in-law just retired. 35 years at a sugar plant, owned by Sprekles most of the time. He got a box of Splenda for his retirement

You get him going on Splenda and he'll never shut-up.

[Q Classic]

splenda is the trade name of sucralose.

sucralose, being an undigestible chlorinated form of sucrose.

[Starchild]

mmmmm. All of the flavour none of the ability to be broken down by pesky metabolic enzymes.

[Az]

What's the sequensing for the receptor on the tongue, anyhow?

[Lefty Scaevola]

It is denatured surgar. Still sweet, but no usable calories.

[Az]

It is denatured surgar.

eh?

[Kuciwalker]

Denatured means that it's not in its natural/functional conformation.

e.g. a denatured protein would just be a bunch of strung out amino acids

[Q Classic]

Were those amino acids strung out on acid?

[Kuciwalker]

[Az]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Denatured means that it's not in its natural/functional conformation.

e.g. a denatured protein would just be a bunch of strung out amino acids

I knew that, and that wasn't my question. I am working with carbohydrates at the lab now. My question is that this is meaningless for table sugar, which is a carbohydrate dimer. with the carbohydrate monomer, D-glucose, for example, 'denatured' would mean an the open-chain form, which is unstable generally, but probably is used as a transition state/short-lived form while being 'eaten up' by enzymes. So I don't really know what this means in this case.

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola
It is denatured surgar. Still sweet, but no usable calories.

Good stuff! I use it on my oatmeal and in coffee from time to time. Also, it's an added ingredient in a number of products I use (i.e. reduced-sugar ice cream, cereal, that sort of thing).

Gatekeeper

[Q Classic]

Oh, I remember one more feature of splenda: you can use it to bake, which you can't with other sweeteners on the market now.

[Az]

Aha! niiiiice. Yeah, it should be pretty close for the receptor. Don't see why wouldn't the enzyme break it up, though.