So I am running an experiment to see if I can get off of Soda. I've been a Soda nut my whole life and honestly take it away from me I am a grumpy sum bitch.....However a lot of guys suggested a try Sweet Tea in place of Soda so I am trying this instead.

Would you say its a healthier comparison to soda? Also any brands you would recommend or make your own?

Healthier if you drink it unsweetened...

Gotta be better than soda. I brew Lipton green tea and only use 3/4-1 cup of sugar per pitcher.

I did the same thing you're doing.

Make your own and use stevia or Splenda.

I also drink the Costco brand diet green tea w/ citrus and it's very good.

Any experience with Arizona brand?

OP,
sweet tea helped me kick the coke habit! Drink tea (aka sweetened tea to um, those people) and gradually drop down the amount of sugar you put in when you make it.

IMO   you are trading one vice for another


I quit cold turkey I got to where I was thirsty all the time and craving sodas or "needing" caffeine

what worked for me was drinking ice cold water
the coldest you can get it before it starts turning to ice

it sounds stupid but it worked

Soda causes bone deterioration.

Luzianne For da winz

Regular sugar is better for you than the HFCS and other stuff found in pop.   I can drink a couple of gallons of tea a day.

I agree....the sugar needs to go and sugar subs simply replace one problem with another.
That said, I use them. I had to give sugar up last September owing to getting type 2 diabetes.
It hurt to give up all my treats...now I don't even miss the crap that I was shoveling into my mouth mostly out of habit.

It won't work.  Soda is like magic.

Perhaps you can try seltzer water and sweet tea.  Don't mix them, just drink them both.

One of them satisfies the bubbles and the other satisfies the sweetness.

if you brew it yourself and sweeten with sugar - it might be a little better.

Drinking Arizona Iced Tea is no different.


I buy seltzer - it's worked for me, no sugar, just carbonation and water.  You can get some with flavors also that are pretty good.

All you need is black coffee, water, and whiskey.

I drink tea all the time instead of pop, in fact the only time I drink that anymore is occasionally when I'm eating at a restaurant or just as a change up. When I was growing up we drank pop constantly and to this day my mom probably drinks a 2 liter of Pepsi a day, a 2 liter of that (or Coke or Mt. Dew or whatever) at my place will go flat before I drink all of it.

I make Lipton green tea, and drink so much tea that I have an iced tea maker; but I don't go crazy on the sugar, I put 3 1/8th of a cup (so 3/8th total) scoops per pitcher so it's sweet enough for me but not call Wilford Brimley levels of sweetness.

I've been a Mt dew drinker since I was in my early teens. Like dew =water besides in basic training. I'm about to switch to Aw diet root beer to get off all carbs. It tastes like regular root beer.

This!

Sugar is sugar

I have been off soda for a month now and have been drinking those carbonated flavored waters. There are several variety flavors. So far the top three for me are orange, lemon, and lime, grape is ok.

This. Or better yet, use coconut sugar or natural local honey.

FTW. It will taste like garbage at first while your body unfucks itself, but then you'll really start to like it.

Better for you? No, sugar is sugar; whether it's sucrose or HFCS your body doesn't metabolize it any different and they contain the same calories. But, if you make it yourself you could always ween yourself off your sugar addiction I guess.

I cut out most soda a while ago going to water and unsweetened tea. That of course developed into a coffee and caffeine addiction Also, when I want something carbonated I really like polar seltzer waters: http://polarseltzer.com/

worked for me.  i rarely drink soda now, unless it's in a cocktail or something...

No it is not. Most soft drinks have corn syrup. Corn syrup derived from freak laboratory-experiment Monsanto corn. Lord only knows what chemical concoction that really is.

Man, drinking the "plain" version of that, both carbonated and flat, is just awful, awful stuff. It should just taste like water but it doesn't.

Water with lemon is all I drink and what i would suggest.

I do drink a little coffee in the mornings but it stays black!

I love my sugar and sodas, but I've been a Type 2 for years, so I've had to give up certain things, mostly.  One of those is sweetened tea.  I probably drink a half gallon of brewed tea a day, or close to it.  I now drink it plain and I was able to transition off of sugar.  I'm doing so with my coffee now, with Splenda and that shit, since I'm also doing the low carb thing this past month.

Sugar has 16 calories/4 carbs (all sugars!) per teaspoon and I was doing 4 tablespoons (4x3=12, 12x16=192 calories) in a big pitcher, so ehhh...

I guess it depends on how sweet sweet is and what you're using?  I can pretty much down that pitcher and have no health/weight penalties, save for a caffeine kick, but I have such a high tolerance for that that it's now not a problem, lol.

Chris

It's prominently featured in the photo, but I've never even tried that one. I buy the variety cases from Sam's with lemon, lime and orange.

If you want to cut back on sugar intake and don't want to do artificial sweeteners, I suggest just get regular unsweetened tea and put in your 1tsp of sugar, and some lemon. One spoon of regular table sugar is 10 calories, the 16oz can of soda pop has ~150 calories, that equals 15 tsps of sugar.

You can also drink the scented soda water from Crystal Geyser available here in Calif. There is also a Trader Joe's version if you have one nearby. It is soda water scented with lemon, lime etc. Zero calories. A 42.5 fl oz is $1.00. I am sure there is an equivalent brand in your city/state. Water is pretty heavy, and transportation costs can be expensive.

People in the Asian world drink unsweetened tea, 2 billion people can't be wrong.

The only harmful thing about soda is the empty calories.  Store bought tea has the same amount of empty calories. So, either keep drinking what you like or find a reduced calorie or 0 calorie option.

Almost all soda uses high fructose as a sweetener, as do some sweet teas. Sweet tea or fruit juice sounds healthier, but its really just the same unhealthy stuff in a different container. Compare the labels, look at the carbs (sugar is factored into the carb value), you'll be surprised.

You're better off brewing your own and using stevia if you need to drink something sweet.

Or just drink water cold turkey and nothing else.

I got a 12 pack of the regular carbonated water and those are awesome. I am going to branch out to more of those LaCroix flavors soon.

And I believe that greens, blacks and whites are actually good for you.

Those Asian people live forever.

Chris

Switching to sweet tea helped me curb my soda habit.  I was drinking 3-4 cans a day, switched to sweet tea.  I didn't really like the taste of the sweet tea, but being able to control (read: slowly reduce) the amount of sugar I put in it helped me with getting my tastebuds re-adjusted.  You have no idea how hideously saccharine everything is until you manage to get off of it and find a new normal that isn't based around super-sweet soft drinks and sandwich bread that's so loaded with HFCS that it tastes like cake.

I eventually went back to soda, but in moderation.  Like one can a day, split into two servings, and watered down by half.  Just too sweet when it isn't watered down.

I drink unsweet tea and add simply lemonade or simply peach fruit drinks as a sweetener.  The idea is to cut back on sugar dramatically not just supplement it.  I went from probably 20-30g of sugar to maybe 5g.  Drink unsweet tea enough you get used to it not being sweet and you can start exploring other flavors of tea.

I can't imagine its healthier. At least the amount of sugar I use. I would suggest grabbing a couple of mio spray flavorings. They taste pretty good.

Brew Lipton Tea, add the Pure Cane Sugar while it is still hot and stir it in.  It never tastes as good if you add the sugar to it once it gets cold.  Gradually add less and less sugar.

Green tea with a bit of honey is my go to cold beverage, I switched from soda to that years ago.

Phosphoric acid

how much sugar is in comparable amounts of each?

I am really hoping this is sarcasm

Arizona has high fructose corn syrup.  I get Pure Leaf or Lipton (both with real sugar)

I did it a couple years ago, for a couple years but it was giving me terrible indigestion and acid reflux. Even spent a night in the emergency room because of the chest pains (I told them it was NOT my heart, but doc's don't listen )
Now I am back on soda and feeling fine.

Wrong.

Fructose (Corn Syrup, HFCS, etc.) is way worse for you than sucrose (table sugar from sugar beets or sugar cane).

Fructose is processed directly from the bloodstream into fat by the liver.  That processing begins as soon as it is in your bloodstream.  Fat accumulates in the liver and causes fatty liver disease.  Look up non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, non-alcoholic steatohepatosis, NAFLD, NASH, etc.

OP, no sugar is best.  Splenda and Stevia are the preferred artificial sweeteners.  Aspartame is bad for you.  Table sugar is better than aspartame.  

Tea is better than soda because it does not have the phosphoric acid and carbonic acids that are bad for your bones and stomach.  It also has flavenoids that are anti-inflammatory.  Green tea is best for you.  Gradually trim the sugar back.  Best of luck.

Community or red diamond.

Tried that.  My Triglycerides soared.

I was hoping to avoid this but, no , he is correct. Sucrose contains 50% glucose and 50% fructose. HFCS contains either 42% or 55% fructose depending on what the food company purchased.

30 seconds on google:

"a broad scientific consensus has emerged that there are no metabolic or endocrine response differences between HFCS and sucrose related to obesity or any other adverse health outcome. This equivalence is not surprising given that both of these sugars contain approximately equal amounts of fructose and glucose, contain the same number of calories, possess the same level of sweetness, and are absorbed identically through the gastrointestinal tract."
http://advances.nutrition.org/content/4/2/236.long


Also:

"The glucose-to-fructose ratio in HFCS is nearly 1:1; similar to the ratio in sucrose, invert sugar, and honey. A similar ratio is also found in many fruits and fruit juices. The only practical distinction in composition between sucrose and other fructose-containing sweeteners is the presence of a bond linking fructose and glucose (sucrose chemical name: ß-d-fructofuranosyl-a-d-glucopyranoside; 17). The glucose and fructose in HFCS, invert sugar, honey, and fruit is principally monosaccharide (free, unbonded). Thus, when HFCS historically replaced sucrose in formulations, no increase in dietary fructose occurred.

Invert sugar is the name given to sucrose in which the bond linking fructose and glucose has been hydrolyzed. This may be accomplished either with acid or enzyme (invertase). Acid-catalyzed inversion of sucrose is accelerated by increased temperature and reduced pH and takes place within time spans as short as minutes to as long as months (9). Because carbonated beverages are low in pH (colas are near pH 3.5) and are stored in warehouses at ambient temperature—sometimes for weeks before they reach supermarket shelves—considerable inversion can take place before the product reaches the consumer. It is a sweet irony that purists who must have their sucrose-sweetened sodas end up drinking a sweetener composition more similar to HFCS and have been doing so since the first cola was formulated in the 1880s."
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/88/6/1716S.full

It's really not that hard to read and educate yourself. Or you can jump on in with the monsanto conspiracy theorists, whatever gets you off.

I went from 1-3 12 oz sodas a day to drinking unsweet tea most of the time.  I still have a little soda now and then.  If you're going to drink sweet tea, make it yourself so you see how much sugar you're putting in.  That will make you want to put less in.  Soda tastes much sweeter to me now than it did when I drank a lot of it.  My carb based cholesterol dropped quite a bit, but I didn't lose any weight from it.

I traded soda for sweet tea, then to half sweet tea, now I drink unsweetened tea. Once you get off the sugar food tastes better, and you feel 100% better.