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Stevia—A Sweet and Sour Tale

Plants & Gardens News Volume 16, Number 4 | Winter 2001
by Niall Dunne

A friend of mine recently returned from a trip to California, and all she could talk about was stevia. “They’re going crazy for the stuff out there,” she said. “They’re using it to flavor everything from their nondairy chocolate-chip cookies to their organic green tea. Some people are even rubbing it on their bodies.”

I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about.

“Stevia is a super-sweet herb from South America,” she explained. “It’s hundreds of times more potent than sugar. And here’s the kicker: It doesn’t have any calories.”

An all-natural, noncaloric substitute for sugar that’s also a skin tonic? It was time for the Happy Herbivore to do some investigating. And I wasn’t disappointed with what I found. The story of stevia is a riveting blend of ethnobotanical lore, political power brokering, and grassroots revolt.

A member of the Asteraceae or Aster Family, stevia (Stevia rebaudiana) is a small perennial shrub native to the highland regions of northeastern Paraguay. Its crushed leaves have been used as a sweetener there for centuries. Common names for the plant include honey grass and sugar leaf.

Stevia has plenty of ornamental appeal, growing 2 to 4 feet tall on slender stems. Its medium green leaves are slightly pubescent, with toothed margins.

When I saw the plant in late October in the Herb Garden at BBG, it was in full bloom. The last of the year’s honeybees were gorging themselves on its many small white flowers.

Under the supervision of the Herb Garden’s curator, Rob Newgarden, I had my first chew on a stevia leaf. Initially, I was in awe of the intense, honeylike sweetness of the thing. As I continued munching, though, I began to notice a slight change in its gustatory effects.

“It has a pretty weird aftertaste,” said Rob. “Kind of reminds me of stale coffee grounds.”

I thought Rob’s assessment a little harsh. There was no denying a bitter aftertaste, but it seemed to me more reminiscent of cheap licorice than a bad cup o’ joe.

Stevia’s sweetness can be attributed to its naturally occurring glycosidic compounds. These include stevioside and rebaudioside A, which when extracted and refined, are 200 to 300 times sweeter than sucrose. Moreover, rebaudioside A doesn’t have the unpleasant aftertaste of the crushed leaf.
Cooking With Stevia

* Stevia Sweet Recipes, by Jeffrey Goottomoeller. Vital Health Publishing. 1999. ISBN 1890612138.
* The Stevia Cookbook, by Ray Sahelian and Donna Gates. Penguin USA. 1999. ISBN 0895299267.

Stevia’s potential as a major commercial sweetening agent has long been recognized. It has been widely consumed in Brazil and Japan for decades. The Japanese use stevia primarily in sodas, candy, and pickled vegetables. The plant was all set to break into the American market in the mid-1980s, when tea companies like Lipton and Celestial Seasonings developed stevia-flavored products and many small companies began to market and sell stevia as a calorie-free sugar substitute.

But then the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) intervened. It began seizing shipments of the plant. In 1991, it declared stevia an “unsafe food additive” and sent out an “import alert” to inspectors in the field.

Numerous petitions were filed to have the ban lifted. Stevia advocates submitted reports from Japanese toxicologists and food-safety experts stating that the plant was risk-free. They also argued that stevia’s long history of use as a food was enough to secure it “generally recognized as safe,” or GRAS, status, and thus exemption from the alert. The FDA, however, was not convinced. Administration officials, citing a few contested studies on laboratory animals, alleged that the plant may have contraceptive properties and may actually lower blood-sugar levels, presenting a potential threat to people suffering from hypoglycemia. The actions of the FDA are shrouded in controversy. Many stevia advocates believe that they are motivated not by concern for public health but by loyalty to the multimillion-dollar sugar and synthetic-sweetener industries. The FDA, of course, denies any such bias.

In 1994, Congress passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act, altering the country’s regulatory procedure for herbs and traditional medicines.

The new legislation allows stevia to be sold as a “dietary supplement” but not as a sweetener.

Stevia is now available in health food stores across the nation. It’s sold in many different forms: as dried leaf, as powdered and liquid extract, and as a cosmetic. But what are people using it for? Some may be using it to improve their complexions, but most are using it in exactly the way they’re not supposed to—as a sweetener.

There’s a quiet revolution going on, driven mainly by word of mouth among health-food enthusiasts, herb fanatics, diabetics, and New Age folk. Several stevia cookbooks have appeared in recent years, packed with recipes for savories and desserts alike. It seems that stevia just might be too sweet a deal to pass up.

Niall Dunne is Associate Editor of Plants & Gardens News.