Erythritol

About Erythritol

Erythritol is a four carbon sugar alcohol that occurs naturally in small amounts in fruits such as grapes, melons and pears and in fermented foods like wine and soy sauce, and it is also produced in small amounts by the human body. Commercially it is made by fermenting glucose with yeast like fungi. It is somewhat less sweet than table sugar and provides almost no calories. Unlike most polyols, the majority of ingested erythritol is absorbed in the small intestine and excreted unchanged in the urine, so it tends to cause less gas and laxative effect than xylitol or sorbitol, and it does not raise blood glucose or insulin. Oral bacteria do not ferment it to acid. Erythritol is widely used in reduced sugar foods and is often blended with high intensity sweeteners such as stevia and monk fruit. A 2023 study published in Nature Medicine associated higher blood erythritol levels with increased risk of heart attack and stroke and reported effects on platelet activity, prompting further research into its cardiovascular safety.