Fructose
Of the other sugars used by humans, fructose (also known as levulose), a monosaccharide (C6H12O6), is the sweetest (nearly twice as sweet as the table sugar, sucrose); and it is the most water soluble of the sugars.
It is hygroscopic, making it an excellent humectant when used in baked goods. The value of a humectant in baked goods is that it retards their dehydration.
Solution of fructose have a low viscosity that results in lower ‘body’ feel than sucrose but in greater flexibility of use over a wide range of temperatures.
Because of its greater solubility and more effective sweetness than sucrose, fructose is better alternative to sucrose when very sweet solutions are required, as fructose will not crystallize out of solution, whereas sucrose will.
Fructose has sometimes been called the fruit sugar, since it occurs in many fruits and berries. It also occurs as a major component in honey, corn syrup, cane sugar and beet sugar.
In fact sucrose, a disaccharide, is composed of glucose and fructose. Of these tow components, the glucose moiety cannot be monopolized by diabetics and it is for this reason that the ingestion of sucrose cannot be tolerated by diabetics.
Fructose, on the other hand, does not require insulin for its metabolism and can be used by diabetics with no concern. When used with saccharin it tends to mask the bitter aftertaste of saccharin. As its apparently accelerates the metabolism of alcohol, it has been used to treat those suffering from overdoses of alcohol.
It has been recommended as a rapid source of energy for athletes and in combination with gluconate and saccharin, as an economic, effective, safe, low calorie sweetener for beverages.
Fructose
