Maple Syrup goes well with your regular breakfast of waffles and coffee. But did you know that it’s actually more than that? You can use Maple Syrup as a permanent replacement to your refined white sugar.
Maple Syrup is also a sweeter and a lot healthier than refined white sugar. The fine line between healthy and not is how they are processed. Maple syrup a natural sweetener from Canada’s sugar maple tree is processed in a very specific and basic manner. You could almost pass it as a natural extraction of the sap from the tree and putting it right in your jar. The process categorizes the maple syrup as unrefined or extracted in the most natural way as possible. The unrefined character of the maple syrup gives it an edge to retain the nutrients it naturally has.
So What Exactly Are Maple Syrup’s Benefits?
Skin Health Benefit
Maple Syrup is the most natural skin care product as you can get other than raw honey. Both products come from a plant’s sapling. The only difference between them is the kind of sugar-derived plant they are extracted from. Pure maple syrup contains at least 60 beneficial components; that includes vitamins A, B and a couple of powerful antioxidants that are known to prevent cancer and aging. The syrup’s compounds also contain antibacterial properties. Antibacterial properties help in preventing inflammation. The texture and properties of this syrup are rather appealing to the concept of moisturizing. Toss it up with a bead-like texture for gentle scrubbing like oats and you got yourself a natural facial cleanser.
How to insert Maple Syrup in your daily skin care regimen:
- Purchase a raw, unprocessed and organic version of the maple syrup in a reputable store (Trader Joe’s etc.)
- Gently cleanse your face with your facial cleanser from the oil and dirt accumulated the whole day.
- Replace your moisturizing cream with a teaspoonful slather of the syrup on your face (use a clean spoon and not your hand to scoop out the contents to prevent germs from contaminating the jar)
- You may actually retain your favorite moisturizer in your skin care regimen. You may use it after the 15 to 20 minutes immersion of your face from the maple syrup.
- Leave it in your face for 15 to 20 minutes.
- Wash your face thoroughly. You’ll want your face to be rid of the syrupy contents in your bed or else you will be bugged by ants.
Note: There are many ways in which you can insert maple syrup in your daily regimen. You may even use it as a silken body scrub during a bath when you want a spa-like feeling.
Contains More Antioxidants Compared to Your Regular Refined Sugar
Maple Syrup has 24 kinds of antioxidant on its belt compared to refined white sugar.
Antioxidants help the body to protect itself from free radicals found in the air of our environment. These oxidants are the reason for aging and may have an abnormal effect on our cells. Antioxidants are mostly derived from phenolic compounds found in berries, nuts, the maple tree sapling, and fruits in general. With phenolic compounds absorbed by our body, antioxidants are triggered from within. Aside from the anti-aging properties of antioxidants, it also prevents cancer, heart ailments, and diabetes.
It Helps in Digestion Enhancement
High-sugar content artificial sweeteners may pose a dangerous threat to your digestion. The chemicals in your artificial sweeteners are just too much to handle by your digestive system. The constant intake of it in large doses might be a challenge for your stomach to reach the chemical state it needs for the food to be broken down properly. To be exact, artificial sweeteners may cause, diabetes, gout, autoimmune diseases, and many more digestive tract problems. You may want to permanently use maple syrup as an alternative for your artificial sweeteners.
Energy Booster
The syrup is a great helper in perking you up in the middle of the day whenever you feel the most groggy. Substitute it with your sugar in a cup of coffee and you are sure to be fired up for the rest of the day. Manganese, a prominent maple syrup compound, helps in faster energy production. Manganese is an essential element in our body that helps in the synthesis of fatty acids and cholesterol. The synthesis of both is needed for energy production.
Heart’s best friend
With a teeming number of heart ailments plaguing us, statistics show us that heart ailment is included in the top ten deadliest diseases to die in. Heart ailments are closely related to our diet. A slight abuse of our health (like ignoring the fact that you have been eating fast food for the last 2 years) might cause the possibility of acquiring heart ailment of one or two. It is quite clever to use maple syrup instead of your usual refined white sugar. Both have the same quality but maple syrup luckily has Zinc in it. The Zinc content on the maple syrup makes it possible to prevent premature heart ailments or worse stroke. Zinc regulates the movement of the blood in our arteries; making the overall circulation nice and running.
Good for Your Man’s Reproductive Health
Surprisingly, Zinc can also be good for a male reproductive system, particularly the prostate gland. Prostate gland cancer is one of the top killer cancers in men. A lot of these patients usually does not know when it strikes. Prevention is always better than cure. You may use maple syrup more in your daily dose of sugar-cravings if you want to prevent a possible occurrence of prostate cancer. It does not hurt to try.
How to Use and Select the Grades of Maple Syrup?
Maple syrup is not only packaged in one kind. The syrup can be categorized in what Canadians call, grades. There many grades of the maple syrup. It usually depends on what kind of season they are extracted in. To simply it, let’s segregate them from light grade to dark grade. The light graded maple syrup is usually lightly-sweetened while dark ones are strong in flavor and have a bark-like taste to it.
Selecting the best grade for your dish is quite important since each grade is different from the other. There are no rules really in selecting grades and what kind you should use it for. Mostly, maple syrup is incorporated in baking. You may apply what kind of grade you want to use according to your taste.
