The latest nasty showing up in sugar-free foods and drinks is E223. It’s especially triggering for asthmatics, and destroys Vitamin B1 in the intestine. This additive does not provide any beneficial effects whatsoever to the human body.

E223 (Sodium Metabisulfite) is classified as a sulfite and while approved for use in small quantities, E223 destroys Vitamin B1 in the intestine and alters the balance of beneficial and harmful bacteria in the gut. Leading to disruption of the intestinal barrier, creating inflammation. 

But that's not the worst. It can trigger severe allergic reactions - including asthma attacks and anaphylactic breathing difficulties - in sensitive individuals, particularly asthmatics. 

The concern here is that New Zealand consistently has one of the highest asthma prevalence rates in the world, affecting roughly 10% of the general population. This places it well above many OECD nations, particularly for children and adults. Unfortunately, that rate is even higher at 20% for Maori and 15% for Pasifika.

Here is what E223 does in the body:
• Metabolism: When ingested, E223 breaks down into sulfites, which are metabolised in the liver into sulfates and excreted in the urine.

• Allergic-Type Reactions: In sulfite-sensitive individuals, E223 can trigger asthma-like symptoms, including wheezing, chest tightness, coughing, and breathing difficulties as it narrows the airways.

• Irritation: It can cause gastrointestinal issues, including nausea, diarrhoea, abdominal pain, and heartburn.

• Skin Reactions: It can trigger allergic contact dermatitis, hives, and skin rashes.

• Nutrient Degradation: Sulfites can destroy vitamin B1 (thiamine) in the digestive tract. Vitamin B1 is a vital water-soluble nutrient that converts fat, protein, and carbohydrates into energy, essential for metabolism and proper nerve, muscle, and heart function. It acts as a coenzyme in energy production, supports immune system health, and plays a role in cognitive function.

• Potential Long-Term Effects: Some studies have suggested it may destroy gut microbiota, damage the intestinal mucosa, and cause potential neurotoxic effects (e.g., delayed visual response).

So you can put E223 down as another ingredient to be wary of, and to be very careful to avoid giving products like sugar-free syrups that contain E223 to anyone with asthma.

source https://proe.info/en/additives/e223

After looking at chemical based artificial sweeteners and other harmful ingredients in flavours, we decided to manufacture a huge range of flavours that are uniquely built with Inulin.

Inulin is a prebiotic fibre that's found in 36,000 plant species. It regulates fat metabolism, and blood sugars and has links to helping with constipation and depression. And now in a double blind scientific study, it's been discovered that people with prediabetes who took inulin lost significantly more weight, and more fat from around the stomach area than those who took cellulose over 18 weeks. 

How Inulin works is by mixing with water to form a gel that slows down how quickly digested food leaves the stomach. This helps you to feel fuller for longer, stimulates the growth of beneficial bacteria improving your gut health.

Here's what happened in this scientific study They took 44 people, all diagnosed with prediabetes so they had elevated blood sugar levels but not quite high enough to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Half the group were given inulin, the other half cellulose. It is what is called a double blind test because the participants had no idea which group they were in.

During weeks 1-9 a dietician supported both groups, and the dietician had no idea what group the participants were in either. After 9 weeks both groups had lost 5% of total body weight. 

At the 9 week mark, full MRI body scans measured overall weight, fat accumulated around the body and organs. Metabolism glucose, insulin and GLP-1 levels were measured.

During weeks 10 - 18 the subjects continued to take the inulin and cellulose supplements as they headed into a maintenance phase with no further external support. When re-measuring the inulin group lost significantly more body weight (1.8% to 2.8%) versus (0.2% to 1%) on cellulose.

Not only was there a substantially higher overall weight loss, when the study repeated the MRI body scan at 18 weeks, they discovered that the inulin group had much lower fat specifically around the stomach area, consumed less food in meals due to already feeling satisfied, and their blood sugar levels remained stable.

Their findings concluded that Inulin may have a two-pronged effect on the risk of diabetes by 1) promoting weight loss 2) reducing body fat around organs and the stomach in people with prediabetes, independent of weight loss.

So Inulin does amazing things and how it works is quite similar to the effects that weight loss injections are trying to achieve with synthetics. 

We have 3 ways to assist you to incorporate inulin into your world:

• unflavoured, pure, zero carb Beneo brand available in jars and 1kg bags

• unsweetened natural flavours in 500g bags

• Flavour Its which are a huge range of Inulin based natural flavours, delicately sweetened by pure monk fruit range.  

With so many natural inulin flavours to choose from, you can dose everything and anything with them. Water, Protein Shakes, Cereals, Yoghurt, Coffees, Baking, Chocolates, Jams, Ice-cream. It's so versatile, that the list is endless.

However you choose to dose it in, inulin is super promising as a weight loss supplement that targets exactly those wobbly bits that many wish they could banish from their life.

The thing with products that contain Maltitol is that they taste so damn good, but then you're left to solve the mystery ... exactly how many carbs does this item have? 

The most dangerous thing about Maltitol is that it's becoming sneakily hidden 
Memorise the ingredient number E 965 because often Maltitol isn't even listed by its name. It appears under Sweetener as (965) as well.
Often products that contain Maltitol don't sell. While researching we have seen the following examples of actions taken by sellers of products that contain Maltitol to purposely obscure the information about Maltitol from the consumer:

• websites with blurred nutritional panels
• websites with images that won't zoom in so you can't read the back label
• completely missing nutritional panels / no back photos of packages at all
• cut off nutritional panels - a search of the manufacturer's website shows the remainder of the nutritional panel along with the Maltitol component
• incorrect calculations of carbs where the total amount of polyols / sugar alcohols have been deducted from total carbs, even when Maltitol is the major sugar alcohol listed high up on the ingredients list.

These actions are what is most alarming, because it's removing choice from consumers, who have a legal right to be able to read ingredients lists and nutritional panels. So to counter the lack of information forthcoming from those who sell products containing Maltitol, we have compiled a massive list below of over 65 products that contain Maltitol. Plus, we've broken down their carbs and maltitol grams. In this way, we can raise awareness of products where their carbs are understated and identify those products which have already included Maltitol grams into their carb calculations. 

Why is Maltitol put in food in the first place? 
Manufacturers are using Maltitol to replace sugar and facilitate a decrease in calories and sugar content in foods. As far as an ingredient performance goes it is well known to enhance taste, nutrition, texture and is a low cost ingredient. 

Maltitol and the Glycemic Index
Although maltitol is also a sugar alcohol, its GI at 35 is higher than most others. Xylitol is 13 and Erythritol is 0 GI. Meaning that Maltitol has a greater effect on your blood sugar levels.

Maltitol is always excluded from the carbs number showing 
Maltitol falls into the product labelling category of polyols or sugar alcohols and that means they have not been included in the calculation for net carbs. This is because New Zealand and Australia manufactured foods are required by law to state carbohydrate content excluding sugar alcohols. 

When you see Polyols on the labels 
Food legislation states that sugar alcohols / polyols are to be listed separately on the nutrition information panel. But that can cause issues in products that contain many different sugar alcohols (because they are rolled up into the one number). 

Product Labels 
This leaves us facing the challenge of detecting Maltitol in ingredients lists and then calculating its mystery carbs by guessing about how many grams are present in the item we've inadvertently consumed. So further below you will see our list of products containing Maltitol including their grams. 

What happens to Maltitol in the body?
Maltitol is partially absorbed by the body and on average provide half the energy of carbohydrates. While this has some effect on blood sugar levels, this is not to the same extent as carbohydrates. 

Side effects of Maltitol 
For some it ends in migraines, stomach upsets or cramps, bloating and gas issues and an undesirable laxative effect. 

So how do you count Maltitol?
For every 1 gram of Maltitol, you can add 0.9g of carbs to your macro count and 2gm of water weight to your body used to process the carbs.  

A list of products that contain Maltitol
• So their carbs are understated
• With carb grams excluding maltitol + maltitol grams. 

Should you find another product containing Maltitol and wish to have that added to this list to raise awareness and protect the health of others, please email details of it to us at KetoStoreNZ@gmail.com 

Atkins Advantage Bar 3g carbs + 4.6g maltitol 
Atkins Endulge Chocolate Break 2.3g carbs + 8.1g maltitol 
Atkins Endulge Chocolate Mint 1.7g + 6.6g maltitol 
Atkins Endulge Caramelised White Chocolate 7.1g carbs + 25g maltitol
Atkins Turkish Delight bar 2.6g carbs + 3.1g maltitol 
Atkins White Swiss Roll 1.4g carbs + 5.7g

Cracked Zero Sugar Hard Shell toppings
• milk chocolate 200ml 6.7g plus the sweetener is an unspecified amount of maltitol. 
• white chocolate 200ml 12.8g plus the sweetener and 2nd biggest ingredient is an unspecified amount of maltitol
For a Maltitol free option: Melt Vitawerx milk, or white bars or Dark Chocolate Chips in the microwave 3x10 seconds stir in between, then pour over ice-cream and it gives you a hard choc ice-cream topping.

Equal Milk Chocolate no sugar (1st ingredient Maltitol) 33g carbs + unknown Maltitol - it's the largest and 1st ingredient in the list and higher than the 23% milk solids.

Double D's marshmallows 0g carbs + 36g Maltitol 
Maltitol free are Double D's butter candies, or hard boiled lollies
An alternative is Protein Marshmallows or our Caring Candies 

Famous Candy Co Koalas per 100g = 55.3g carbs 
Famous Candy Co Soda Bottles per 100g = 55.3g carbs 
Famous Candy Co Snakes per 100g = 55.3g carbs 
these figures include the Maltitol - and at > 55% carbs, it's not low carb. 

Golden Grahams Protein Bar 22g carbs + 12g Maltitol

Grenade Bars Birthday Cake 8g carbs + 10g Maltitol 
Grenade Bars Caramel Chaos 9g carbs + 11g Maltitol 
Grenade Bars Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough 9g carbs + 11g Maltitol
Grenade Bars Chocolate Chip Salted Caramel 9g carbs + 10g Maltitol
Grenade Bars Fudged Up 7g carbs + 5g Maltitol
Grenade Bars Jaffa Quake 9g carbs + 11g Maltitol
Grenade Bars Oreo Protein 10g carbs + 8g Maltitol
Grenade Bars Oreo White Protein 9g carbs +9g Maltitol
Grenade Bars White Protein Cookie 8g carbs + 10g Maltitol

Healtheries No Added Sugar Chocolate bars per 100g 5.9g carbs + 43.9g maltitol. These aren't even low carb! 

Low Carb Life Raspberry White Chocolate Slice per 100g the 7.6g carbs includes the maltitol carbs from their white chocolate chips. It didn't used to contain maltitol and the makers had to change supplier for the chocolate. This is the only product that Keto Store NZ sells that contains Maltitol because we have independently verified that the carbs for the whole entire slice are 7.6g 

Musashi Protein Bar White Chocolate Wafer 9.7g carbs + 2.4g maltitol
Musashi Protein Bar White Chocolate Caramel 3.5g carbs + 3.8g maltitol 
Musashi Protein Bar White Chocolate cookies and cream protein crisp 10.3g carbs + 3.3g maltitol 
Maltitol free option there are some Musashi bars that are maltitol free. Just check the ingredients panels. 

Noshu Chocolate Chip cookies mix 27.8g carbs + 4.5g maltitol
Noshu - chocolate baking chips:
98% sugar free chocolate baking chips (orange pack) 7.1g carbs + 47g maltitol
Noshu White baking chips (peach pack) 11.2g carbs + 35g maltitol 
Noshu Dark Chocolate Baking Chips (red packet) 6.7g carbs + 47g maltitol
Maltitol free option 95% sugar free (purple pack) Milk Chocolate Melts with chocolate covered strawberries on the art work carbs 6g.

Nuttvia 97% less sugar Hazelnut spread per 15g (1 Tablespoon) 8.7g carbs + 6g polyols, a combo of Malitol as its main sweetener, Maltodextrin which has a GI of 165 and Erythritol. This product will spike your blood sugars and most likely kick you out of ketosis from the maltodextrin.

Sugarless Milk Chocolate 9.7g carbs + 41.8g maltitol 
Sugarless Dark Chocolate and Mint 5.2g carbs + 31.8g maltitol 
Sugarless White Chocolate 13.5g carbs + 43.5g maltitol 

Sugarless Soft Black Licorice 6.1g + 69.9g maltitol 
Sugarless Soft Strawberry Licorice 0.2g + 51g maltitol 
Sugarless Aura Licorice Swirls 0.2g + 51g maltitol 

Sugarless Hard Boiled Candy Lemon 0.1g + 59g maltitol 
Sugarless Hard Boiled Candy Blackcurrant 0g + 58.7g maltitol 
Sugarless Hard Boiled Candy Butterscotch 0.5g + 52.8g maltitol 

Sugarless No Sugar Ginger Range of Candies 0g + 9.1g 
Sugarless Cool Jack the Shark Jellies 0.2g + 66.5g maltitol 
Sugarless Casino Jellies 0.45g + 66.2g maltitol 
Sugarless Fruit and Cream 0.2g carbs + 66g maltitol 
Sugarless Charming Snakes 0g carbs + 74.25g maltitol 
Sugarless Berry Jellies 0g carbs + 74.3g maltitol 
Sugarless Red Frog Jellies 1.4g carbs + 74g maltitol

Sugarless Chews Berry Mix 0.5g carbs + 65.7g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Caramel 0.2g carbs + 66g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Mint 0.1g carbs + 67g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Raspberry 0.8g carbs + 65.6g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Strawberry 0.2g carbs + 66g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Strawberry Cream Jellies 2g carbs + 74g maltitol 
Sugarless Chews Vanilla and Choc Mix 0.2g carbs + 66.5g maltitol 

Sugarless Be Smart Chocolate Beans 6.3g carbs + 58.3g maltitol 
Sugarless Chocolate Crunch Balls 5.2g carbs + 37.1g maltitol 
Sugarless White Chocolate Crunch Balls 6g carbs + 38.6g maltitol 

Schoc Sugar-Free chocolate
All products made with their sugar-free chocolate including Easter Eggs have 5g carbs + 44g Maltitol

Well Naturally 99% sugar free Raspberry Jellies 6.7g carbs + 32.5g maltitol 
Well Naturally 99% sugar free Strawberry Bites  23.3g carbs + 45.6g maltitol 
Well Naturally 99% sugar free Snakes 6.5g + 32.2g maltitol 

Wrigleys Extra White bubblemint / peppermint / intense mint sugar free 0g carbs + 29.4g Maltitol 
Maltitol free options are the 14 piece envelope range of Extra flavours sweetened with sorbitol and mannitol. Always read ingredients lists! 

Zilch Icecream per 100g 4.5g carbs + 6.2g Maltitol  
Zilch Chocolate per 100g 4.5g carbs + 6.2g Maltitol
Zilch Wild Berries per 100g  4.2g carbs + 6.5g Maltitol 
Zilch identifies Maltitol as 965 instead of using its name on their product labels. 
However it is accounted for on its own separate line in their nutritional panels.

Ingredient E466 is Carboxymethylcellulose or CMC for short. 
It is an emulsifier ingredient that appears in a whole host of foods.

How is it made?
CMC is a genetically modified, synthetic by-product made from wood pulp and cotton lint, treated with acid to break it all down to form the Carboxymethylcellulose.

Is E466 safe?
Up until 2015 it was thought to be safe. Since then both animal and human studies have proven that CMC has significant negative health impacts on gut health, obesity and metabolic syndrome. So far only animal studies have linked it to cancer – due to the challenges in ring fencing CMC consumption by humans over a long period of time, in order to draw more firmer conclusions. 

In Europe the Food Safety Council equivalent requested safety data to be presented for CMC and not one single item of data was submitted to prove its safety. Due to the lack of data provided a safety assessment could not be performed so CMCs are banned for consumption by a proportion of the population there.

Is CMC a vegetable gum?
In the case of Queen Fine Food's sugar-free Maple Syrup, CMC is being passed off in ingredients lists, as a much healthier sounding vegetable gum. E466 is not a vegetable gum. It is an unnatural, synthetic, health deteriorating ingredient.  At the time of writing this, it is interesting to note that the Queen Fine Food's own Australian website doesn’t even list the ingredients of the sugar-free maple syrup and the product’s back panel image is completely missing in action.

How does CMC show up on nutritional panels?
CMC is not absorbed or digested, so the FDA allows it to be included with “dietary fiber” on food labels reducing the amount of carbs being declared in products aimed at the health conscious. As dietary fibre is an optionally measured ingredient, there’s no way to know how much E466 you are consuming in a product like the Queens sugar-free maple syrup.

What do the human studies tell us about this ingredient? 
An alarming study of humans in 2015 linkages were proven between CMC to deterioration of gut bacteria, inflammatory bowel disease symptoms and conditions like obesity and metabolic syndrome.

In February 2024 the results of a nearly 7 year duration study of 92,000 French healthy adults linked CMC to significant deterioration of gut bacteria and inflammatory bowel disease symptoms. While the cancer causing part of CMC testing wasn’t conclusive in adult humans, the animal studies that did prove causation of cancer, also shared the studies exact same findings about gut health too. There have also been separate studies linking gut bacteria to the causation of cancers.

What do the animal studies tell us about this ingredient?
Four separate animal studies have also proved linkages between CMC to deterioration of gut bacteria, intestinal inflammatory bowel disease symptoms, obesity and metabolic syndrome symptoms. But in an alarming escalation, the animal studies also linked CMC consumption to increased incidences of cancer (breast, prostate and colon).

How much CMC were the test subjects consuming?
In 2021 a randomised controlled human study found even a 15ml daily portion of E466 consumed over just 11 days, caused significant deterioration and lack of diverse stomach bacteria, leakage through the intestinal gut wall.

References of the important studies for your further reading: 
Animal studies about E466
• Causes chronic intestinal inflammation [58,59].
• Altered intestinal microbiota diversity [20,26,60,61].
• Promotion of carcinogenesis (cancer) demonstrated [20,26,60,61].
• Linkage between cancers and gut health cancers  [23,24] 

Human studies about E466
A first randomised controlled trial on carboxymethylcellulose (E466) was conducted in 2021 [25] with a dietary intake of only 15g per day over just 11 days. In that time there was:
• increased abdominal discomfort and gut inflammation markers
• weakened the intestinal barrier allowing bacteria to enter a normally almost-sterile inner mucus layer
• reduced gut microbiota diversity, which affects capability and resilience to process food
• altered microbiota composition, which negatively affects protection against pathogens, stimulation of immune response as well as impairing production of vitamins.
These findings are all pre-cursors to the increase in a person’s susceptibility to various forms of cancer. [23,24] 

In a mass scale study of 92,000 randomised healthy French individuals who were followed over 6.7 years and fed E466 in controlled groups amongst other emulsifiers. This study suggested direct associations between exposures to 7 individual and 3 groups of commonly used food additive emulsifiers and cancer (breast, prostate and colon) risk in a large prospective cohort of French adults. [70],

However, the impact of food additive emulsifiers on cancer risk or progression is yet to be explained and current knowledge is based on scarce, contrasting evidence from experimental studies on animals [26–28]. To our knowledge, no epidemiological study has investigated the links between exposure to emulsifiers and cancer risk in humans, due to important challenges in accurate and reliable estimation of exposure to additive emulsifiers. And businesses that don’t even declare it as CMC and instead hide it behind the words vegetable gum don’t help people to identify exactly what is in their food. 

And it is possible to develop foods without these emulsifiers. I know this because i have done this when developing our own zero carb, real food ingredient Keto Store Maple Syrup and Keto Honey. So possible but not cheap, a bit like health really.

IMO doesn’t only stand for In My Opinion. There’s an ingredient called Isomalto-oligosaccharide (pronounced as i_so_malt_o_og_le_o_sac_ha_ride) or IMO in a much easier to say short form.

IMO is a type of carbohydrate found naturally, typically in the form of Tapioca Starch made from Cassava root. You’ll see IMO show up in ingredients listings as fibre syrup, tapioca starch or just IMO. In products it is used for giving texture, flavour and fibre and keeping food naturally made, without artificial additives.

In Australia IMO is a novel (new) food and because the fibre testing method wasn’t approved, it has always been treated as a carbohydrate. However in the USA, IMO was being tested and classified as a dietary fibre, which was treated as having zero or lower carbs. 

Carbs get metabolised and converted into energy in the body. Fibre passes on through without getting metabolised, so there’s no conversion to energy from fibre.

How carbs and fibre are counted matters to those following a Keto way of life, because it can take a food item off the menu as being no longer even Low Carb.  
Total Carbs less Dietary Fibre = Net Carbs
If dietary fibre is too high, and carbs are too low, it misrepresents the way IMO is processed in the body. 

Due to testing methods being conducted in the USA, recent insights have been brought to light regarding how IMO is processed in the body. Where IMO was once considered a dietary fibre in the USA, it is now being deemed as a carb.

By following the USA approach, many sauces and products based on fibre syrups have been marketed as having zero / lower carbs. But due to the testing changes, now their carbs are understated on their nutritional panels.

Lollies like Funday which are made in Australia have already split out their carbs, with
• the majority as non-available (fibre that just passes on through un-metabolised)
• the minority as available carbs (gets converted into energy and counts in daily macros).
By distinguishing the types of carbs information, it’s a better representation of exactly how that product travels through your body, giving reassurance it’s accounted for correctly.

So be wary where you see fibre syrup IMO ingredients + high fibre values, without them being broken down into available and unavailable carbs! Due to the changing carb classification, they may have higher carbs than what you are seeing on the nutritional panel.  

Additionally with fibre syrups being a liquid, they reach the stomach much quicker than food does and their effect on the body happens faster. Whereas IMO in more solid food like lollies, are wrapped up with other food ingredients like inulin and gelatine, and take more time when travelling to the stomach giving a slower release of energy. Blood sugar impacts are a whole other discussion, and so I have left that for another topic.

One thing we all miss on our Keto Diets is bread. The convenience of sandwiches.

We've looked long and hard, and the evidence is clear - this is the Best Keto Bread Ever!

We stock all the ingredients, but better yet, we have this as a Recipe Pack.
Everything is pre-measured and packed, and together with our easy-to-follow "How To," you can make this bread fresh at home.

You can find the Recipe Pack here