NuNaturals All-Natural Monk Fruit Liquid Plant-Based Sweetener, Zero-Calorie, Low Glycemic, 2 oz

For several months I have been completely off sugar. It was really hard at first, trying to experiment with different sweeteners. In my case, no sugar also means: -no honey -no maple -no coconut or date sugar for me, all three still cause the same issues as sugar. -no erythritol or xylitol (can cause strokes and I have that risk) -no allulose (causes GI issues) -no stevia (don't like the taste) -no saccharin (no chemicals!) -no sucralose (no chemicals!!) Have I left anything out? Basically the only alternatives have been to eat real fruit when I need something like that, or eat foods with no sugar. I even started drinking coffee sometimes, since I like it unsweet. This is fine most of the time, but in my tea, oh boy. I can't drink tea without sweet. That leaves one standing alone...monkfruit. The monkfruit brands/varieties I've tried are: -Lakanto (be careful of the powered one, it's mostly erythritol) -Lakanto caramel drops -Lakanto vanilla drops -Namanna powder -Now foods drops and now this NuNaturals. I started with the Now foods, recommended by a friend, who said it was the best and she'd tried them all. I thought it was so-so. The issue is, once it's sweet enough, it has a kind of saccharine sweetness and the mouthfeel is all wrong. It feels "dry" on the tongue, not juicy like sugar. The Lakanto caramel was next. It's ok I guess. The smell reminds me of artificial butter flavoring, like you'd get on popcorn in a movie theater. That odor does give me a cringey feeling. Once I got past that, it does have a better mouthfeel than the Now foods. It's closer to sugar. It works OK in tea, but it was very icky when I tried it as an ingredient in a few dishes. Namanna is very nice as an ingredient in dishes. It has a decent mouthfeel and *some* juiciness, but it tends to an extreme sweetness once it's sweet enough. It also has a slight "fruity" cast to the taste. It works pretty well in hot chocolate, but it's a bit weird in tea and doesn't dissolve that easily. Next came Lakanto vanilla. I like it less than the caramel flavor by itself, but mixed with the caramel, it gives a closer approximation to real sugar than one or the other alone. Still, the mouthfeel is on the dry side, and there are those artificial "aftertastes." It works decently well in cocoa but it adds an undesirable flavor profile in tea. Finally I tried the NuNaturals. I honestly didn't have much hope since the reviews were just so-so. But...this one is reallllly close to sugar. I mean, like 98% close. It was sooooo good in my tea just now, that my endorphins went wild and I felt like I was going to have an inevitable sugar crash. The mouthfeel is almost perfect. Like I said, this is by far the closest approximation to real sugar that I can find. For the record, Bochasweet tastes more like sugar than this, but sadly it's erythritol, so therefore, just plain unhealthy and on the "do not allow" list. But...taste and mouthfeel wise, this monkfruit is second only to Bochasweet, which is IMO 99.5% like sugar. So this NuNaturals is really, really close. A note on dosing. I don't know what the package says, but I find 11 drops to taste like 1 teaspoon of sugar. I take 2 slightly rounded teaspoons of sugar in my 12oz cup of tea, and 22 drops was absolutely perfect. I seriously had a moment of "oh no!" because the taste and mouthfeel were so close that I could have convinced myself there was real sugar in my tea cup. Do note that since I've been off sugar for several months now, it's possible that my senses have adapted. So, if this is your first experience with a healthy sweetener, your experience may not match mine. However...I'd say try this one first, and you may not have reason to experiment with all the others. A note on travel-ability. This and the Now Foods travel best. The flavored Lakanto drops are convenient but I have to bring both bottles for taste, and they need to be in a ziploc bag to avoid spills since the caps can pop off. The Namanna is fiddly and a nonstarter for travel. The glass dropper bottle with good seal is the best of all options. I should be able to toss it in my purse along with a couple of tea bags, and I'm good to go for a weekend trip. Some have pointed out that you have to use a lot of this one. That may be true, I do have to use more of it than the Lakanto or Now foods drops. However, that aspect might be what's getting the taste and mouthfeel just right, so I'll GLADLY buy more of this just to have the real sugar taste. You're welcome.

NuNaturals is several times sweeter than Now. Being liquid, it mixes instantly in hot and cold food. It tastes better than powdered Bulk Supplements and much, much better than Swanson. I like the glass bottle and truly functional glass dropper that allows for exact measurement. It always comes securely packaged in its own protective box. Although I'd be delighted to buy a larger quantity at a reduced price, at least the 2 oz. bottle requires a minimum of counter space. The lid screws on securely, so it can be carried in a backpack without leakage. NuNaturals is on my Subscribe and Save because I never want to run out.

My favorite sugar alternative w/ no bitter aftertaste

I love that it’s healthier than sugar and that’s a plus. So far I’ve used it on my hot teas and coffee (just received my sweetener 2 days ago)

Of the three exclusively Monk Fruit liquid sweeteners that I've used, this was the least appealing. This product seems too diluted, which makes it expensive. I didn't notice significant sweetening of an average-sized cup of coffee with 8 drops--much more than the 5 drops recommended on the bottle. Other Monk Fruit-only liquid sweeteners that I've used sweeten a cup of coffee significantly with 4-6 drops. The flavor is also not great. It seemed surprisingly dull or hard to identify as monk fruit extract, even with 10 drops. This brand reminded me of a soda pop dispenser that has run out of syrup at a restaurant. On a positive note, I like the glass bottle and liquid dropper.

It is way better than the packages of the monkfruit .. one or two drops and you are good

I wasn't sure about this product. I use Allulose. I use monkfruit packets for my coffee. I got this for added sweetness to recipes without using an enormous amount of other sugar substitute products. It's just too expensive. So I got this. I used a couple of drops in my coffee. I like a sweet and light coffee. It didn't leave an aftertaste. I can see that if you do get an aftertaste it's probably because you used too much. Take it slow...one drop at a time until you find the level of sweetness you want. Give it a try. Is a whole lot less expensive than some of the other brands.

This product is mildly sweet--not nearly as sweet as liquid stevia. I used several droppersfull to replace a small amount (~1Tbs) of sugar in a muffin recipe, and I could not detect any sweetness at all in the final product. It's almost as if the product lessened the taste of the other sweet components in the recipe (there were honey, bananas, etc.) This may work well to sweeten a hot beverage (and you'd want it to be hot to burn off the alcohol base), but you'd still need to use quite a bit to equal the sweetness of other products.

Doesn't leave a bad after taste. Use it regularly.