Altoids Sugar-Free Smalls: A Reformulation and Resizing of Those Curiously Strong Mints

I confess to be a lover of mints. The stronger they are, the better I like them. As a consequence, over the years I settled into sucking on (and admittedly sometimes biting into and chewing) the original Altoids.

One day, about a year ago, my wife pointed me toward an article in a health newsletter that talked about the potential dental damage done by these highly concentrated sugar treats, so I set about to find out just how good and strong a mint was possible to make without using sugar.

Frankly, most of them are simply terrible. Amongst the very worse, I am sorry to report, are those 'organic' sugar-free mints made by Newman's (Paul.) They taste like mud is one of their chief ingredients. I was really hoping to like them. I tried many, many others.

Using no sugar, they were sweetened with aspartame, saccharine or other common non-sugar sweeteners. All left an unpleasant aftertaste and were no where close to being as genuinely refreshingly minty as my old favorites, the Original Altoids, those curiously strong tablets which originated in merry old England, as the insert will explain.

On the verge of giving up and taking my chances in continuing to support my dentists ability to send his children to the very best universities, while waiting in the checkout line at a local Trader Joes, I espied a little box labeled "Altoids: Sugar-free Smalls." I thought, 'well, I've tried so many others - How bad could they be? And went on to buy some.

I have good news and bad news.
First the good.
They are better than most other sugar-free mints. They ARE refreshing, stronger than I expected and leave no after taste.

Then, the bad.
They are very small. They are sweetened with Sorbitol (a sugar alcohol based bulk sweetener that is said by my dentist to not promote tooth decay) and are pretty tiny and cost a lot more expensive than the regular Altoids. I consume them two at a time. Two contain just over 11 calories. Negligible - or so I have persuaded myself when the choices are plastic, dissolve in your mouth sheets or bad tasting pseudo-mints.