Coffee mate does it spike blood sugars

KennyA

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
3,377
Type of diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
Hi, I am new here and new to diabetes being recently diagnosed and never had to worry about my diet “at all” although have always been mindful of fatty foods and keep them in moderation but have a few vices like:

1. Sugar

2. Potatoes

3. and yes Coffee mate :(

Since diagnosed I have the libre link plus system to monitor my blood sugar (the lack of prescription support in this area being another conversation) and have been alarmed how much my blood sugar rises after one coffee :( even without sugar I can be at 5 mmol and rise as far as 13mmol in a very short time frame.

I also use Erythritol (YET another conversation as apparently it helps to cause heart attacks) as a sweet alternative.

Although I do believe double cream is bad for cholesterol so a catch 22?

Could anyone advise on any other low cholesterol alternatives? Or they all as bad as one another to get the creamy taste?
I am not at all concerned about cholesterol - my cholesterol level hasn't shifted, ever. And you make 80% of your cholesterol yourself, it doesn't come from food.

I have been low carbing for nearly five years now and a higher percentage of my food is fat - all natural saturated fat from meat and dairy, with some olive oil. No sugar, root vegetables, bread, pastry, fruit, rice or pasta. I can't give you any "low cholesterol" alternatives.

So my use of double cream in coffee (and eating other fats) has had no impact on either my blood glucose or cholesterol.
 

Paulgee3

Member
Messages
9
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
the single paper released last year on this that caused a media stir showed association not causation (ie it could be heart disease causes erythritol in the blood not the other way around and the people in the study already had heart issues). Yes it warrants further investigation but the actual paper didn’t say erythritol causes heart attacks, even if some media poorly worded reporting made it sound that way. I paid attention and did the reading because I also use erythritol and wouldn’t if I thought the research actually showed this.

Avoid it if you prefer to be cautious by all means - but please be accurate in reporting stuff like this because it can cause unnecessary worry.
Bit Harsh mate? I was not reporting anything! and certainly did not want to alarm anyone, I did say: "YET another conversation as apparently" not knowing the true or full story myself, thanks for expanding....
 

Paulgee3

Member
Messages
9
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
I am not at all concerned about cholesterol - my cholesterol level hasn't shifted, ever. And you make 80% of your cholesterol yourself, it doesn't come from food.

I have been low carbing for nearly five years now and a higher percentage of my food is fat - all natural saturated fat from meat and dairy, with some olive oil. No sugar, root vegetables, bread, pastry, fruit, rice or pasta. I can't give you any "low cholesterol" alternatives.

So my use of double cream in coffee (and eating other fats) has had no impact on either my blood glucose or cholesterol.
I am a little older so cholesterol is a concern for me personally but will dig more deeply into this and thank you for such an informative post, this helps a great deal, the only positive part of the whole thing is I get to eat more steak :) ribeye preferably.

Looking back I think I went undiagnosed for a very long time, since being diagnosed other past events are making more sense, I have been in and out of hospital since my 40's so why this was not picked up on the radar before I have no idea.
Again thank you for a great reply, I have started using the libre 2 plus sensor.
 

HSSS

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
7,597
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
Bit Harsh mate? I was not reporting anything! and certainly did not want to alarm anyone, I did say: "YET another conversation as apparently" not knowing the true or full story myself, thanks for expanding....
it wasn’t meant as harsh so sorry if it came across that way - just a request to keep it accurate (Although many media reports failed that goal). Nor did I believe you meant to worry anyone either.

Your statement
it helps to cause heart attacks
was the specific wording my comments were aimed at as the studies didn’t ever say that, though much reporting heavily implied or outright claimed this I concede. And yes you did use “apparently” to mitigate the second hand nature of your comment.

Apologies again if my tone missed the mark, just a bit of a pedant about misleading medical statements and this particular one appeared a lot last year.
 

HSSS

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
7,597
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
I am not at all concerned about cholesterol - my cholesterol level hasn't shifted, ever. And you make 80% of your cholesterol yourself, it doesn't come from food.

I have been low carbing for nearly five years now and a higher percentage of my food is fat - all natural saturated fat from meat and dairy, with some olive oil. No sugar, root vegetables, bread, pastry, fruit, rice or pasta. I can't give you any "low cholesterol" alternatives.

So my use of double cream in coffee (and eating other fats) has had no impact on either my blood glucose or cholesterol.
Mine shifted. It goes the wrong way on carbs and the right way on keto, with all the saturated fats and creams etc. As does blood glucose control and weight.

Pre diagnosis it was all not quite ideal. A year on keto and it was all much better and mostly optimal and stayed that way til I wobbled badly on my diet control and everything went back to how it started. Back to better eating and I’m expecting it all to return to better levels again.
 

lady misty

Newbie
Messages
4
Hi, I am new here and new to diabetes being recently diagnosed and never had to worry about my diet “at all” although have always been mindful of fatty foods and keep them in moderation but have a few vices like:

1. Sugar

2. Potatoes

3. and yes Coffee mate :(

Since diagnosed I have the libre link plus system to monitor my blood sugar (the lack of prescription support in this area being another conversation) and have been alarmed how much my blood sugar rises after one coffee :( even without sugar I can be at 5 mmol and rise as far as 13mmol in a very short time frame.

I also use Erythritol (YET another conversation as apparently it helps to cause heart attacks) as a sweet alternative.

Although I do believe double cream is bad for cholesterol so a catch 22?

Could anyone advise on any other low cholesterol alternatives? Or they all as bad as one another to get the creamy taste?
Hi I too love coffee mate. I usually change between milk and coffee mate.
Not knowing which to use.
So if you find out anything useful I would be interested
 

KennyA

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
3,377
Type of diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
I am a little older so cholesterol is a concern for me personally but will dig more deeply into this and thank you for such an informative post, this helps a great deal, the only positive part of the whole thing is I get to eat more steak :) ribeye preferably.

Looking back I think I went undiagnosed for a very long time, since being diagnosed other past events are making more sense, I have been in and out of hospital since my 40's so why this was not picked up on the radar before I have no idea.
Again thank you for a great reply, I have started using the libre 2 plus sensor.
If your age given is accurate, I'm older than you.
 

KennyA

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
3,377
Type of diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
Hi I too love coffee mate. I usually change between milk and coffee mate.
Not knowing which to use.
So if you find out anything useful I would be interested
Coffee mate is about 56-57% carb.

Milk is about 5% carb.

So a lot depends on how much of each you use. A teaspoon is about 5 grams, so a single teaspoon of coffee mate is around 2.8 grams carbs, about the same as 50ml of milk.
 

Durangotan

Newbie
Messages
3
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Insulin
Hi, I am new here and new to diabetes being recently diagnosed and never had to worry about my diet “at all” although have always been mindful of fatty foods and keep them in moderation but have a few vices like:

1. Sugar

2. Potatoes

3. and yes Coffee mate :(

Since diagnosed I have the libre link plus system to monitor my blood sugar (the lack of prescription support in this area being another conversation) and have been alarmed how much my blood sugar rises after one coffee :( even without sugar I can be at 5 mmol and rise as far as 13mmol in a very short time frame.

I also use Erythritol (YET another conversation as apparently it helps to cause heart attacks) as a sweet alternative.

Although I do believe double cream is bad for cholesterol so a catch 22?

Could anyone advise on any other low cholesterol alternatives? Or they all as bad as one another to get the creamy taste?
Hello. I'm new here as well. I'm a yank and used to use a lot of the liquid coffee mate I would bring with me from the US. I, too, use a Libre system and have seen my readings spike from around 6 to as high as 10.5 after just ONE cup of coffee. It's the corn syrup solids they use instead of sugar. In the US, they don't have to disclose the corn syrup solids contained within as "sugar" or "carbs". Double cream is HORRIBLE for cholesterol, but it's SO GOOD! I have quite the addiction to sugar as well as i'm sure many of us do on this forum! When it was discovered that Erythritol could potentially lead to heart attacks, I stopped using artificial sweeteners altogether. It's been far better for me to have a small, sweet, biscuit containing real sugar for a daily treat than to ingest artificial sweetener chemicals in anything else I consume. All said and done, i've found it far better to just use a small amount of single cream with my morning cup. I see very minimal effects on my BG levels with it. I have yet to find anything other than real cream that can even compare to that rich, creaminess in my coffee.
 

KennyA

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
3,377
Type of diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
Hello. I'm new here as well. I'm a yank and used to use a lot of the liquid coffee mate I would bring with me from the US. I, too, use a Libre system and have seen my readings spike from around 6 to as high as 10.5 after just ONE cup of coffee. It's the corn syrup solids they use instead of sugar. In the US, they don't have to disclose the corn syrup solids contained within as "sugar" or "carbs". Double cream is HORRIBLE for cholesterol, but it's SO GOOD! I have quite the addiction to sugar as well as i'm sure many of us do on this forum! When it was discovered that Erythritol could potentially lead to heart attacks, I stopped using artificial sweeteners altogether. It's been far better for me to have a small, sweet, biscuit containing real sugar for a daily treat than to ingest artificial sweetener chemicals in anything else I consume. All said and done, i've found it far better to just use a small amount of single cream with my morning cup. I see very minimal effects on my BG levels with it. I have yet to find anything other than real cream that can even compare to that rich, creaminess in my coffee.
I'm a double cream user, it has no effect on my cholesterol.
 

Melgar

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
1,084
Type of diabetes
Other
Treatment type
Tablets (oral)
Hi and welcome @Durangotan, are you living in the UK? I’m on the Canadian west coast. You will likely get a different perspective on fats here if you read through some of the forums. Fats have a bad rap. Fats and the low fat hypothesis have been put under the microscope, especially the LDL fats by the medical community on both sides of the Atlantic. It’s an individuals choice as to how seriously you take these view points, but there are some persuasive arguments to counter ‘bad fats’. The Clot Thickens by Malcolm Kendrick is worth a read.
 

HSSS

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
7,597
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
Hello. I'm new here as well. I'm a yank and used to use a lot of the liquid coffee mate I would bring with me from the US. I, too, use a Libre system and have seen my readings spike from around 6 to as high as 10.5 after just ONE cup of coffee. It's the corn syrup solids they use instead of sugar. In the US, they don't have to disclose the corn syrup solids contained within as "sugar" or "carbs". Double cream is HORRIBLE for cholesterol, but it's SO GOOD! I have quite the addiction to sugar as well as i'm sure many of us do on this forum! When it was discovered that Erythritol could potentially lead to heart attacks, I stopped using artificial sweeteners altogether. It's been far better for me to have a small, sweet, biscuit containing real sugar for a daily treat than to ingest artificial sweetener chemicals in anything else I consume. All said and done, i've found it far better to just use a small amount of single cream with my morning cup. I see very minimal effects on my BG levels with it. I have yet to find anything other than real cream that can even compare to that rich, creaminess in my coffee.
See post #20 regarding erythritol not being shown to lead to heart attacks. Association is not causation. It could be just as a much heart disease causing the erythritol to be present. Nor is it classed as artificial (that’s the ace k sucralose, aspartame stuff not those made from plants like erythritol and stevia).

That said and the pedant in me satisfied if you’ve adapted to no sweetener even better. Cheaper and healthier too.
I agree with the others. Eating saturated fats instead of carbs improved all my cholesterol readings for whatever it’s worth. To be fair I’m not worried about it anyway as I believe the more modern and better evidenced research that fat is not the evil we‘ve been led to believe, that most of the numbers in the standard panel mean little without further details generally unavailable and triglycerides are the only part of the panel I’m actually interested in. They fell significantly when I went keto and ate a lot of saturated fat. HDL rose as is desirable and LDL lowered but only slightly.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Omar51

Durangotan

Newbie
Messages
3
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Insulin
See post #20 regarding erythritol not being shown to lead to heart attacks. Association is not causation. It could be just as a much heart disease causing the erythritol to be present. Nor is it classed as artificial (that’s the ace k sucralose, aspartame stuff not those made from plants like erythritol and stevia).

That said and the pedant in me satisfied if you’ve adapted to no sweetener even better. Cheaper and healthier too.
I agree with the others. Eating saturated fats instead of carbs improved all my cholesterol readings for whatever it’s worth. To be fair I’m not worried about it anyway as I believe the more modern and better evidenced research that fat is not the evil we‘ve been led to believe, that most of the numbers in the standard panel mean little without further details generally unavailable and triglycerides are the only part of the panel I’m actually interested in. They fell significantly when I went keto and ate a lot of saturated fat. HDL rose as is desirable and LDL lowered but only slightly.
You're not the first i've heard that from with regards to Erythritol. There's just so much conflicting research out there it's becoming hard to tell what source is correct. As for fats; I had an opposite experience with the fats. I do agree with you 100% on consuming the fats instead of the carbs and it has made a difference for me, but my LDL went through the roof when I was using double cream! When I switched to single things seemed to level out quite a bit. Keto has been an absolute lifesaver for me. Wondering if it might potentially be genetics or dependent on the individual with the HDL/LDL readings? I can't even tell you how many people have had your experience and I think that's the norm, but there are probably 5 or 10 other people i've run across online and IRL who have had the same reaction i've had. Keto has been GREAT though! It's definitely made a huge difference!
 
  • Like
Reactions: HSSS

Durangotan

Newbie
Messages
3
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Insulin
Hi and welcome @Durangotan, are you living in the UK? I’m on the Canadian west coast. You will likely get a different perspective on fats here if you read through some of the forums. Fats have a bad rap. Fats and the low fat hypothesis have been put under the microscope, especially the LDL fats by the medical community on both sides of the Atlantic. It’s an individuals choice as to how seriously you take these view points, but there are some persuasive arguments to counter ‘bad fats’. The Clot Thickens by Malcolm Kendrick is worth a read.
Hi, Melgar! At present I am back in SW Colorado. I lived in London for about three years and now spend a lot of time travelling back and forth with my job. I've definitely seen the contrasting viewpoints on fats firsthand. I think i'm probably just one of those people who is genetically predisposed to high cholesterol levels and such so I think it wise that I exercise more caution than the average Joe. Consumer deception in the US is rampant when it comes to the population about what it consumes. We have so much processed food and there is sugar in everything. It's horrible. When I was diagnosed years ago I started to realized just how much Americans are poisoning themselves with the foods they eat. The food available in much of Europe is SO much cleaner and better for you than the States. After working for a year in Greece and seeing the results eating so much good Mediterranean food I switched to an organic/non-GMO diet it's made a world of difference in being able to maintain a stable BG level. I actually have that Kendrick read in my flat in London, but I haven't read it. Looks like I need to set aside some time and check that out!
 

Melgar

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
1,084
Type of diabetes
Other
Treatment type
Tablets (oral)
Hi, Melgar! At present I am back in SW Colorado. I lived in London for about three years and now spend a lot of time travelling back and forth with my job. I've definitely seen the contrasting viewpoints on fats firsthand. I think i'm probably just one of those people who is genetically predisposed to high cholesterol levels and such so I think it wise that I exercise more caution than the average Joe. Consumer deception in the US is rampant when it comes to the population about what it consumes. We have so much processed food and there is sugar in everything. It's horrible. When I was diagnosed years ago I started to realized just how much Americans are poisoning themselves with the foods they eat. The food available in much of Europe is SO much cleaner and better for you than the States. After working for a year in Greece and seeing the results eating so much good Mediterranean food I switched to an organic/non-GMO diet it's made a world of difference in being able to maintain a stable BG level. I actually have that Kendrick read in my flat in London, but I haven't read it. Looks like I need to set aside some time and check that out!
Canada is not much better re processed food, but I think you guys inch us out on processed foods and sugars. Actually it depends on the province. I’m in British Columbia, not far out of West Vancouver, which is one of those very trendy places and very typically west coast. I lived in a London for 20 years. I loved the place, until I didn’t. I was a lot younger then.

Fats - I am very iffy with fats, especially animal fats. I feel nauseous after eating something fatty. I have absorption issues as I have Coeliac. All that said, my LDL’s are high, my HDL‘s are high normal, but my Triglycerides are low at 0.54. They are dropping with every Lipid test that done. I am not as concerned about my LDL’s after reading the current research around the so called bad fats. Like @HSSS said, I turn to my Trigs for a better indicator.
 

HSSS

Moderator
Staff Member
Moderator
Messages
7,597
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
You're not the first i've heard that from with regards to Erythritol. There's just so much conflicting research out there it's becoming hard to tell what source is correct.
that’s because I read the report itself and read the assessment of experts who also did, rather than relied on some dubious paraphrasing from reporters writing clickbait articles. I’m not saying definitively there isn’t an issue. I’m saying this one report it all stemmed from did not show there was a problem. It showed a connection but nothing about cause or direction of the link. Further study might clarify what the reality is. I continue to use erythritol when I absolutely “need” (want) sweetener.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Durangotan

Omar51

Well-Known Member
Messages
761
Type of diabetes
Prediabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
See post #20 regarding erythritol not being shown to lead to heart attacks. Association is not causation. It could be just as a much heart disease causing the erythritol to be present. Nor is it classed as artificial (that’s the ace k sucralose, aspartame stuff not those made from plants like erythritol and stevia).

That said and the pedant in me satisfied if you’ve adapted to no sweetener even better. Cheaper and healthier too.
I agree with the others. Eating saturated fats instead of carbs improved all my cholesterol readings for whatever it’s worth. To be fair I’m not worried about it anyway as I believe the more modern and better evidenced research that fat is not the evil we‘ve been led to believe, that most of the numbers in the standard panel mean little without further details generally unavailable and triglycerides are the only part of the panel I’m actually interested in. They fell significantly when I went keto and ate a lot of saturated fat. HDL rose as is desirable and LDL lowered but only slightly.

About 10 years ago I used American liquid coffee mates, spiked my BG a lot. Stopped and now I love my black coffee ️( no sugar or anything). Now I don’t even think about it, I think it takes time to develop taste. Sorry if this is not the right thread.