Coco or Palm? Sweet Answers are needed. We carry Palm Sugar and Coconut Palm Sugar here and we are often asked um, are these the same things? The Short answer..NO. The long answer is:
Coconut sugar is made from the sap of cut flower buds of the coconut palm, instead of from the sap of the tree itself.
Coconut Palm Sugar is made from the coconut palm tree, the same tree that grows coconuts for other purposes.
Palm Sugar may be made from the same coconut tree, or it may be made from one of two other varieties of palm trees which also produce a sweet nectar. Palm sugar was originally made from the sap of the Palmyra palm, the date palm or the sugar date palm. Now it is also made from the sap of the sugar palm and the nipa palm, and may therefore also be sold as "arenga sugar". Palm sugar is made by making several slits into the stem of a palm tree and collecting the sap. The sap is then boiled until it thickens.
Now that has been answered the next question is glycemic index difference. To my knowledge all options coconut sugar, coconut palm sugar and palm sugar are all low on the glycemic index. This is what makes these the choices for raw desserts rather than honey or dates.