They smell very intense and give yoghurt, protein shakes or hot drinks every flavor you can imagine: for example shortbread, vanilla, white or dark chocolate. What has some things in common with classic syrup, as you know it from the coffee shop, differs from it in one very important point: Flavor Drops have no sugar, fat or calories. FITBOOK presents the product – and asked an expert whether the flavor drops are harmful.
Figure-conscious people usually refrain from drinking their cappuccino with caramel or chocolate syrup – after all, a tablespoon brings about 50 additional calories and almost 20 grams of carbohydrates into the cup. For those who would still like it sweeter, the solution seems to have been found: completely sugar and fat-free flavor drops, better known under the product name «Flavor Drops» or «FlavDrops».
Nutriful Flavor Drops taste like coffee, chocolate or shortbread, among other things. A bottle costs around five euros
With just one drop, coffee, quark and co. should taste intensely like an aroma of your choice. Last but not least, athletes find this invention really good for pimping their protein shake or low-fat quark, which sometimes tastes rather mediocre without an aroma booster. The product is now available from various manufacturers in the fitness sector, including Nutriful and MyProtein and OstroVit. They recommend using «the tasteful companion» in the kitchen at home or carrying it in your handbag so that it can also be used in drinks or food when you are away from home.
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Even salad dressing is almost calorie-free
The manufacturers of the sweet Flavor Drops have also been making sauces for a while, the classic versions of which are more of the heavy and hearty variety. While regular Thousand Island dressing – an American type of spiced mayonnaise – has around 370 calories, 35 grams of fat and 15 grams of carbohydrates per 100 grams, a substitute product from the Flavor Drops manufacturer is just fat and sugar-free seven calories. How can that be?
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That’s what the expert says about Flavor Drops
It seems a bit strange that the highly concentrated miracle drops should contain «natural ingredients», as do the completely low-calorie sauces that taste like cream and cheese. «It is determined by food law which manipulations can be described as ‘natural’,» assures Munich ecotrophologist Professor Nicolai Worm when asked by FITBOOK. As an ecotrophologist, he deals scientifically with topics related to nutrition and the household. Worm didn’t know the Flavor Drops yet, but doesn’t find them particularly spectacular. «You can buy flavors and colors like that, we already have them in thousands of other foods.»
If you look at the labels of the sweet drops, almost all of them have the following ingredients: water, aroma and as a sweetener: sucralose. Colors and preservatives are often added. As with all sweeteners, the same applies to sucralose: Officially, they are considered harmless, but they are suspected of promoting diabetes, as Israeli scientists at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot found out in a study.
According to nutritionist Worm, it is common practice for ready meals in particular to contain flavorings and colorings
Expert criticizes comparative information as «dubious»
However, what irritates Prof. Worm about the Flavor Drops is the nutritional table presented on the Nutriful website. “The comparative data are dubious. Where do the calories come from when there’s zero sugar and zero fat?» Instead, starch, protein, and most importantly, large amounts of chemicals would have to be included to create «an acceptable texture and taste.»
Prof. Worm finds the nutritional information irritating
Photo: PR
Are the products harmful?
The flavorings and colorings contained are approved in Germany and are therefore harmless to health – otherwise the products would not be on the market here. Nevertheless: «Nobody needs the stuff, and nobody gets healthier with it,» according to the nutrition expert. In order to sell it, you need apparent arguments like «vegan» or «zero grams of fat», which in reality should not convince anyone. «It is neither healthy nor desirable to eat zero grams of fat,» says the scientist.
Conclusion on Flavor Drops and Co.
Even if the whole thing doesn’t sound particularly ‘healthy’, according to the expert Worm, there is no risk of ingesting questionable substances with substitute products such as Flavor Drops and the like. Nevertheless, whether you want to include foods based on flavorings and colorings in your own diet is a personal decision.