Round 2: Day Four.

Day four was not exactly laden with healthy foods. After day three's slip up, the dessert cravings did return and I scrambled to my kitchen to find something to satisfy my sweet tooth without cheating. I settled for organic strawberry yogurt, and eventually an organic PB&J.

In case you haven't noticed, my salvation for this project is organic sugar. In round one, I deemed it allowable without reason and I continue to allow it in round two. However, deep down I know it's still cheating.

Unfortunately, in today's society EVERYTHING is sweetened. Unless you have the time and money to slave over a home cooked meal, there's really little you can do to cut out sweeteners entirely. The only way I've found to avoid refined sugar and corn syrup [sugar's evil twin] is to shop organic. But even us health nuts like things sweet. We did, after all, grow up in America where the largest fast food chain puts sugar in even their meat. So most organic foods are sweetened with 'organic raw sugar' or 'evaporated cane juice' which are basically two apples from the same tree. Occasionally you'll get lucky [and pay more] when a company sweetens with agave nectar.

Agave nectar is heaven sent for a health conscious sweet tooth. Not only is it almost twice as sweet as sugar, it also has no effects on the blood's glucose levels, making it safe for diabetics, and avoiding the sugar crash for the rest of us. But, as I said, this is a rare find in the grocery section [try Amy's Kitchen if you're interested though] so I have to make an argument for the organics.

A little creative web searching tells me that organic sugar IS a healthier alternative. Because it is un-refined, it still maintains some nutritional value and is 50% less processed than regular white sugar. It is also metabolized in the body slower than the processed alternative [aka less spike in blood sugar levels].

For me, that's enough to ease the guilt.