It's so great that you talk about your diet here! I would like to add that fatty foods themselves do not increase glucose levels, but they do lead to the accumulation of excess weight, which is a risk factor for diabetes. But (not many people know about it) nonfat kefir seriously increases blood glucose levels. For years, doctors said that sour fruits are much healthier for diabetes than sweet ones, since they do not affect glucose levels. But in recent years, scientists have found that both green apples and bananas raise sugar levels in the same way. The most useful, according to experts, are foods rich in plant fiber (whole-grain bread, vegetables, greens), unsaturated fatty acids (fish) and non-caloric sweeteners. Experts do not completely ban alcohol, but advise its significant limitation. This includes its high caloric content. For example, 1 gram of alcohol contains 7 kilocalories.The fact that beer is more caloric than spirits is a myth, beer is the lowest caloric of all alcoholic beverages, 100 grams has as many calories as in fruit juice. However, beer is drunk much more.
What is maltitol? Maltitol is a sugar alcohol used as a sugar substitute. It has 75–90% of the sweetness of sucrose and nearly identical properties, except for browning. It is used to replace table sugar because it is half as energetic, does not promote tooth decay, and has a somewhat lesser effect on blood glucose. What is maltodextrin? Maltodextrin is a polysaccharide that is used as a food ingredient. It is produced from vegetable starch by partial hydrolysis and is usually found as a white hygroscopic spray-dried powder. Maltodextrin is easily digestible, being absorbed as rapidly as glucose and may be either moderately sweet or almost flavorless.
I plan to try a number of different brownie recipes, starting with this one... Brownie Recipe #1: ½ cup (1 stick) butter 2 oz semi-sweet dark chocolate, chopped ¾ cup sugar (So, ½ cup sugar = ¼ teaspoon of stevia or monk fruit extract. So, ¼ cup sugar = ⅛ cup extract. So, ¾ cup sugar = ⅜ teaspoon extract.) ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder 1½ tsp vanilla 3 eggs ½ cup all-purpose flour (I'll use whole wheat four instead.) 1 tsp baking powder ¾ tsp salt ½ cup chopped walnuts (optional) Preheat the oven to 350°F. Melt the butter and chocolate together in a pan set over low heat. Stir in the sugar, cocoa, and vanilla and remove from the heat. Add the eggs, flour, baking powder, and salt and whisk until smooth. Stir in the walnuts if using. Pour the batter into an 8" x 8" baking pan coated with a bit of nonstick spray. Spread the batter out into an even layer. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out nearly clean. (If you like your brownies less fudgy, bake a few extra minutes, until the toothpick comes out perfectly clean.) (The result is cooling right now. I'll see what it tastes like in the morning.)
The brownies did not taste as close to the "real deal" as the banana pancakes and the carrot cake, but I am not tempted to increase the sweetener to see if this will make a difference, because I think the monk fruit extract has a certain distinct flavor that becomes detectable if I use enough of it (it will take me a couple of additional months to recognize the flavor for sure, if it is even there in the first place) that makes everything taste the same. (I'm trying to use up all the monk fruit now, and I'll begin using the Stevia later, since it has a much longer shelf life than the monk fruit.) Besides, the experience was good enough to do the job that I needed, which was to "trick" my brain into feeling like I had a proper dessert so that I would not be tempted to eat something that contained granulated sugar. Also, next time I'll have my brownie with a cup of hot tea, which is almost sure to leave me even more satisfied. But, in the final analysis, I would have to say that I was more or less pleased with the outcome.