My parents can’t taste anything discernibly wrong with Stevia, and they’ve used it to replace Splenda. I have used Equal (NutraSweet) in the past and happily use Splenda now (preferring it to table sugar), but Stevia tastes simply awful to me.
From what I can tell, liking previous artificial sweeteners has no bearing on whether or not you’ll like Stevia.
No opinion on stevia, but I want to point out that xylitol is not artificial.
I have tried Zevia Sodas all the flavors lack any desirable taste to me. What I am doing til some big name colas come on the market is make my own. I have had great success using Stevia in the Raw with some unsweetened cola syrups.
I find this surprising. “Hippies” in my experience aspire to use more traditional sweeteners–honey, raw cane juice, maple syrup, stuff like that. I’ve had some fantastic drinks made with those.
I bought Truvia and didn’t care for it one bit. I tried it in coffee and tea. It was almost bearable in tea but I prefer my liquid sucralose drops. That is some awesome stuff there. So much better than Splenda, although I do love me some Splenda too.
I have wondered whether the processing of the stevia plant has changed over the years, and this is why:
Vernors is a soda that I have always adored. Regular soda <non-diet> has given me heartburn since forever, so I never drink it, always diet. Except for Vernors, cause it’s just so good <to me> that it’s worth it a few times a year. It tastes like a combo between ginger ale and cream soda.
I didn’t drink it for a few years, and then a few years ago found some and…it tasted different. Did some digging, and apparantly Vernors’ original recipe used stevia. Then stevia was banned or whatnot, so they switched to something else, and that changed the taste.
I will have to try Vernor’s again now, to see if they’re using stevia again, cause I really really liked that soda.
I actually revise my review! I like Truvia quite a bit, as well as the store-brand of it.
My initial review was for straight-up Stevia, in a dropper bottle, from Whole Foods. That shit was nasty. But actual Truvia has improved drastically. Because it’s a plant, the various brands taste wildly different, whereas Splenda is sucralose, and it’s all the same.
So try a different brand, you may be surprised.