By 'pink stuff' I assume you mean saccharine, I would assume that any non-calorie, no carb (or super low carb) sweetener is as acceptable as the next for the purpose of counting carbs. Be advised that some artificial sweeteners mimic symptoms similar to MS, my aunts doctor told her she had to stop using artificial sweeteners for some number of weeks before he could be sure of her diagnosis.
I found a reference to stevia in an old version (2000) of Atkins book, almost in passing towards the end in maintenance he suggests using stevia as a sweetener when confronted with cravings. However he did not go into how much was okay or anything like that. I believe this book is a revised version of his 1997 book, so stevia was still getting established in the US and he may not have had extensive information on it. I still haven't scraped up the money for some pure extract, but hopefully next month.
if the link below works it talks about the different sweeteners, not including stevia.
http://www.bami.us/Diet/ArtificialSweeteners.html
Sweeteners
Not only that, but something doesn't have to be super sweet for it to taste good to me now. Splenda just tends to slow me down for some reason -- I think it's the maltodextrin that they use to 'bulk' it. And since it isn't really calorie or carb free except in tiny amounts, I don't like to use but maybe 4 packs a day. I had used the granular for cooking, but was VERY upset to find that 1 cup on Splenda for baking actually has 96 calories and 24 grams of CARBS! I mean, that's still better than sugar, but WOW. It's not Splenda that has the carbs, but the 'bulker'; aka maltodextrin. So, I was just curious to know if the newer addition of Atkins book mentioned any of the natural sweeteners like the Stevia. I am going to try making some of my protein cookies with the Stevia and see how it turns out. If I can't get a good baking consistency, I'll just quit using the Splenda in drinks and that way I won't be going overboard if I decide to have something else with it in it.
