Chewing Gum That Makes Sugar Taste Like Sand

Chewing an ancient Indian herb may be just the solution to halt your sugar cravings.

Gymnema sylvestre, which has been used in traditional medicine for 2,000 years, impairs the ability to taste sugar by blocking the tongue’s sweet receptors. Israeli food tech start-up Sweet Victory uses it as the active ingredient in their chewing gum.

Popping a piece of their gum can stop you tasting the sugar in any food within minutes, and the company says that its effects last up to two hours. 

“After two minutes of chewing the gum, which tastes like regular minty gum, you can discard it.” says Shimrit Lev, co-founder of Sweet Victory. “Sugar will taste like sand to you. You will feel the texture of any food you eat, but be unable to taste its sweetness.”

Prior to founding Sweet Victory, she and co-founder Gitit Lahav worked in the health industry, helping clients lose weight. “We both knew about the plant itself before we knew about its benefits.” Lev tells NoCamels.

“One day, a big shipment of the plant arrived, and for some stupid reason, I tried to chew the leaves. They were very bitter and I spat them out. Then I ordered myself a fruit shake, but when I took a sip it tasted like water. It blew my mind, and I understood that it must be related to the leaf.”

She and Lahav knew that this was going to be a game changer. The challenge now was to find a way to share the benefits, without people having to eat the plant.

At first, they experimented in their kitchens with homemade chewing gum recipes and gum-making kits. It took them three years to develop and perfect their product. The gymnema sylvestre is native to India, and Lev and Lahav needed to find a way to source the plant on a massive scale, but didn’t have any connections to the Indian market. They turned to the Israeli ambassador to India, who helped them find an organic source for the plant.

Their product, Sweet Block, was initially sold in France and Panama, where regulations on food supplements are more relaxed. It hit the shelves in Israel last month and there are plans to expand into America in October, and to sell it on Amazon.

Sweet Victory now wants to definitively prove that their gum helps people reduce their sugar intake. As per a recent agreement signed with the Ichilov hospital in Tel Aviv, researchers will study its effects on diabetic patients. It is easier to document diabetics’ sugar intake, since their blood sugar levels react faster. Clinicians will monitor the participants’ blood sugars online, which will help provide solid evidence. 

The Sweet Block gum has the potential to help many people who don’t have the willpower to resist sugary foods. Over four in 10 people in the United States are obese, and over half of the Israeli population is described as overweight. 

Beyond battling sugar cravings in adults, Sweet Victory has set their sights on combating the childhood obesity epidemic. Between 2017-2020, obesity affected about 14.7 million children and adolescents in the United States alone. These numbers are rising in Israel as well. In Israel, almost 13 per cent of children are categorized as obese, and about 29 per cent are defined as overweight. 

Given these statistics, Lahav and Lev have created the very first formulation of their product for children. The prototypes’ flavors include Tutti-frutti and Tropicana. “It’s delicious, and tastes like a real, but sugar-free, candy. It’s very effective.” Lahav tells NoCamels. 

Both the child and adult versions of Sweet Block contain gymnema, the Indian herb that blocks the tongue’s sugar receptors. According to Lev and Lahav, there are no adverse health impacts from chewing too much of their product. 

Trials in Israel, the United States and France found that children enjoyed the gum – and most importantly, that they couldn’t taste sweets afterwards.

Sweet Victory faces a couple of competitors in the United States that also use gymnema sylvestre. Sweetkick sells tablets that melt on the tongue, and Sugarbreak also produces a chewing gum. “What is unique in Sweet Victory is that we invested a lot of time and effort to ensure that chewing our gum feels like a real treat.” says Lahav. 

Sweet Victory sent their product for me to try for myself. After a minute of chewing a piece of gum, I was completely incapable of tasting anything sweet for over an hour. Cookies, chocolate, even fruit – they all retained their textures and other flavors, but any sweetness had been completely eliminated. AG.

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