Polyols and Blends

Icon Foods supplies bulk sugar alcohols and engineered blend systems to food and beverage manufacturers across North America. Thirty-one grades spanning erythritol, xylitol and maltitol, in conventional and organic, in four particle sizes, and in pre-built blends with stevia and monk fruit.

What Are Sugar Alcohols?

Sugar alcohols, also called polyols, are carbohydrates that resemble both sugar and alcohol in molecular structure while being neither. They occur naturally in fruits and vegetables and are produced commercially by hydrogenating sugars.

In formulation they do the structural work sugar does. They provide bulk, body, crystallization behavior and mouthfeel, at a fraction of sugar’s caloric contribution and with little or no glycemic impact. High-intensity sweeteners like stevia and monk fruit cannot do any of that, which is why most reduced-sugar systems pair the two.

Sugar Alcohols vs. Sugar

The comparison most formulators are actually making. Four differences matter.

Sweetness. No sugar alcohol matches sucrose exactly. Xylitol comes closest at 1:1. Maltitol runs about 0.9. Erythritol sits at 0.6 to 0.8. Isomalt is lower still. Anything below parity needs a high-intensity partner to close the gap.

Calories. Sucrose delivers 4 kcal per gram. Maltitol is roughly 2.1, xylitol about 2.4, and erythritol is very nearly zero. That difference is the reason the category exists.

Browning. Sugar browns through the Maillard reaction. No sugar alcohol does. If your product depends on color development, a polyol alone will not deliver it, and you need a rare sugar like tagatose or allulose in the system.

Digestive tolerance. Sugar alcohols are incompletely absorbed, and the unabsorbed fraction ferments in the large intestine. That is the mechanism behind laxation statements on sugar-free products. Tolerance varies enormously by polyol and is dose-dependent. Erythritol tolerates best. Maltitol and sorbitol tolerate least.

Choosing Between Sugar Alcohols

Three questions usually settle it. Does the product need sweetness parity, or can you compensate elsewhere? Is a cooling sensation an asset or a defect in this matrix? And what is your realistic serving size, since tolerance is a dose relationship rather than a property.

Gum and mints want xylitol, where cooling helps and non-cariogenic properties matter. Chocolate wants maltitol, where cooling hurts. Panned confections and near-zero-calorie systems want erythritol. Hard candy often wants isomalt.

Why Blend?

Twenty-six of the thirty-one products in this category are blends rather than single ingredients. That is not a merchandising decision. Blending is a formulation strategy, and it solves problems a single sweetener cannot.

Synergy produces a better curve than any single molecule

Different sweeteners have different sweetness kinetics. Some deliver rapid onset. Some peak late and linger cleanly. Layering them aligns those temporal differences into something closer to sucrose: early onset, balanced mid-palate, clean finish.

That is why ErySweet+® reaches 2 to 3 times the sweetness of sugar when erythritol alone sits at 0.6 to 0.8 and the stevia fraction is small. The combination delivers more than the arithmetic suggests.

Blending reduces off-notes without adding maskers

Bitterness, licorice and metallic notes come from over-reliance on a single glycoside. Erythritol carries a cooling effect. Stevia carries licorice. Monk fruit carries a mild melon character. In the right ratio these dilute each other rather than stacking.

The practical consequence is that a well-built blend needs less flavor masking downstream, which removes cost and development time from the project rather than adding it.

Cost in use, not cost per kilogram

Higher sweetness intensity means lower inclusion for the same effect. A 2 to 3x system used at a third the rate of a 1:1 ingredient can land cheaper in the finished product even at a higher price per kilogram.

The same logic applies within the high-intensity fraction. Reb M used alone is expensive. Paired strategically with Reb A and monk fruit glycosides, total glycoside usage falls while sensory quality holds.

Consistency you cannot get blending in-house

Pre-blended and co-milled means uniform particle distribution and batch-to-batch consistency. Blending components at line speed risks segregation, and segregation in a system where the high-intensity fraction is under 5% produces a product that is too sweet in one bag and flat in the next.

The ratio is the product

Finding the right ratio takes weeks of bench work. What you are buying in a pre-built system is that development time, already spent and validated.

Formulation control

Blends give you a lever. Onset, peak sweetness and finish can be tuned by shifting composition, which single-ingredient systems do not allow. For a formulator working across several product formats, that control is often worth more than any individual ingredient property.

Our paper on the glycoside synergy strategy covers the sensory science behind blend design in detail.

The blend systems in this category

Each family is available in multiple particle sizes, and most in USDA Organic certified through Oregon Tilth.

Particle Size Is Not a Detail

Every family in this category comes in graded mesh, and choosing wrong is one of the more common reasons a reduced-sugar formulation underperforms.

A 20 to 60 mesh crystal behaves very differently in a panned confection than a 130 to 170 ultra-fine does in a dry beverage mix. We stock across the range so the ingredient matches your process rather than forcing your process to match the ingredient.

Labeling

Sugar alcohols declare under Total Carbohydrate, with the Sugar Alcohol subline where applicable. They contribute 0 g total sugars and 0 g added sugars. On an ingredient statement each declares by name: erythritol, xylitol, maltitol, isomalt.

Products containing significant sugar alcohol may require a laxation statement depending on inclusion level and serving size. Confirm requirements for your specific product and market with your regulatory team.

Beyond Sugar Alcohols

If browning matters, or if digestive tolerance is the binding constraint, the rare sugars are usually the better answer. Allulose and tagatose both brown, both are excluded from Added Sugars declarations, and both tolerate well. They are not sugar alcohols and they do not declare as such.

For sweetness alone, see high intensity sweeteners. For bulk and fiber claims together, see fibers.

Custom Blends

If none of the thirty-one grades below fits your system, we build custom blends in-house and mill to your specification. Tell us the application, the sweetness target, and the label constraints. See custom blends and formulation support.

Samples in 24 to 48 Hours

Every product on this page is available as a sample with full documentation, and we hold no minimum order. If a grade below is not the right answer we will say so and point you at what is.