A pinch of salt beats a teaspoon – less is definitely more when it comes to the sodium you consume and your health. High blood pressure, heart attack, stroke and chronic kidney disease risk: Salt overload is a major culprit in all these health conditions.
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High intake of sodium is the cause of the most worldwide deaths from dietary causes, according to the Global Burden of Disease study, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. “Excess salt consumption kills more people than any other cause on planet Earth,” says Dr. Michael Greger, founder of NutritionFacts.org and a member of the U.S. News Best Diets expert panel. “It’s the single worst thing we can do for our bodies.”
The “fantastic news” is that we have almost ultimate control of this important risk factor, Greger says: “That’s not adding salt at the table, not adding salt while we’re cooking and reducing our intake of processed foods.”
Public Health Goals for Sodium Levels
The U.S. government has called on food companies and restaurateurs to cut sodium levels. The goal: to prevent health conditions linked to regularly consuming too much salt. However, you don’t have to wait for those gradual, modest adaptations to happen to make healthy changes in your own diet.
In October 2021, the Food and Drug Administration issued voluntary sodium reduction goals for commercially processed, packaged and prepared foods. Encompassing 163 food categories, the FDA guidance provides short-term sodium reduction targets for food manufacturers, chain restaurants and foodservice operators.
“We always knew that a lot of the sodium was coming from packaged, processed and prepared foods,” says Sharon Palmer, a registered dietitian based in the Los Angeles area and the author of books on plant-based eating and the Plant-Powered Dietitian blog. “So, the FDA seems to be putting focus on that because it’s so impactful.”
Daily Salt Recommendations
How much sodium per day should you aim for? Within about two years from now, the FDA’s aim is to decrease U.S. consumers’ average sodium intake from about 3,400 milligrams to 3,000 milligrams per day – roughly a teaspoon less. This new sodium ceiling still exceeds sodium recommendations from two different health organizations:
- Department of Agriculture. According to the USDA’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2020-25, the daily sodium nutritional goal for healthy adults is 2,300 milligrams.
- American Heart Association. The AHA recommends no more than 2,300 milligrams of sodium a day, with an ideal limit of no more than 1,500 milligrams per day for most adults, particularly for those with high blood pressure.
What You Can Do to Reduce Salk Intake
Aiming for a low sodium intake is important for your health. Nutrition experts suggest steps you can take now while buying, preparing and ordering food to reduce how much salt you eat without missing it.
Salt-Savvy Grocery Shopping
So many choices, so many sodium-laden foods. Grocery shopping is the starting point for managing how much salt you and your family eat:
- Read the back label. “I encourage people to be really label-savvy,” says Vahista Ussery, a registered dietitian nutritionist, chef and founder of To Taste, a culinary nutrition consulting and education company. Rather than picking up the first item, look at products’ back labels to compare nutrition facts, not hype. “Manufacturers can put really misleading lingo at the front of the package,” Ussery says, pointing out that ‘halo’ words like ‘organic’ don’t necessarily mean an item is a low sodium food.
- Find go-to products. It can be time-consuming to check the label of every single product when you’re shopping, Palmer notes. Instead, experiment a little with products you frequently use, such as pasta sauce, tomato soup or snacks to find the lower-salt version you like. By choosing favorites, she says, “You don’t have to do a lot of homework each time.”
- Consider daily values. The Nutrition Facts panel actually gives two numbers for nutrients like sodium: First is the amount of sodium in milligrams per serving (180 milligrams, for instance); the second number is “% Daily Value” (7%, for instance). That lets you tally how big of a bite a single item would take out of your daily sodium limit. “A general rule of thumb is: If something is 20% or higher in the Daily Value, that’s a product that’s pretty high” in sodium or another nutrient, Palmer says. “If the Daily Value is 5% or less per serving, it is considered ‘low’ in sodium,” says Joan Salge Blake, a clinical nutrition professor at Boston University.
- Try a simple grocery store trick. Greger suggests another easy way to identify foods high in sodium is by using the Nutrition Facts label. “You just want to have your sodium content be lower than the caloric content,” he says. For example, if a serving is 300 calories and sodium is 700 milligrams: “Oh, 700 is larger than 300 – put that back on the shelf.”
- Give reduced-salt items a chance. Food manufacturers are wary about labeling products ‘low-salt’ because consumers often think ‘bad taste,’ Palmer says. “Don’t just assume it’s not going to taste good,” she advises.
- Watch out for certain sodium sources. Frozen entrees, store-bought breads and processed or deli meats can contain significant sodium levels, Palmer cautions.
- Avoid self-evident salt. Visibly salty pretzels or items like sea-salt potato chips give you all the info you need without even checking the label.
- Put whole foods in your cart. Start out in the produce department and fill up on fruits and vegetables, which are naturally low in sodium and contain healthy potassium. Potassium, like salt, is an essential mineral. Among other functions, both are involved in maintaining normal fluid levels in the body. Unlike salt, however, people tend to actually consume less potassium than recommended.
Cutting Salt at Home
Your own kitchen and pantry are great places for practicing salt management:
- Get cooking. “The more people learn to cook, and cook from scratch, that really allows you to control the amount of salt you put into your food,” Ussery says.
- Season without salt. With a well-stocked spice rack, the food you prepare never has to be bland. “Learning to rely on spices and herbs, and using acidic ingredients like lemon and lime juice and balsamic vinegar, can all help you season and flavor your food before (turning) to salt,” Ussery says. Spices like turmeric can bring extra health benefits.
- Sprinkle instead of spooning. Adding a pinch of salt instead of the entire teaspoon that a recipe calls for is a simple trick for reducing salt.
- Build flavors gradually. Another strategy is to build flavor with small amounts of salt and pepper during each step of the culinary process. “I find if you season throughout cooking with salt, you end up using less than if you wait until the very end,” Ussery says.
- Think acidic. If you’re cooking a dish and find it tastes flat, don’t immediately reach for the salt shaker, Ussery suggests. “A lot of times what’s really missing is the acidic element,” she says. “So a squeeze of lemon juice or a splash of vinegar helps to brighten those flavors, very similar to what salt does.”
- Snack mindfully. Make popcorn from scratch with the kernels, for a healthy, whole-grain snack. Ussery also recommends fruits and veggies for snacks, and you can get creative. “Combine a nut butter with some fruit,” she suggests. Nuts and seeds make great snacks in themselves, she says – just keep an eye on sodium content. “There’s the whole gamut: You can find them from unsalted to pretty heavily salted.” If you must have potato chips, have a smaller serving but munch on some celery as well, she suggests. That way, you’re mixing a vegetable in and still getting that crunch.
- Focus on potassium-rich foods. In contrast to salt, increasing potassium in your diet actually reduces your risk of high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke. “We really need to focus on how much potassium we eat, because sodium and potassium work together in our bodies,” Ussery says. Fruits and veggies are rich in potassium.
- Try potassium-based substitutes. Salt substitutes contain potassium chloride, sometimes alone or mixed with regular salt. You can’t tell the difference in taste for brands containing 40% to 60% potassium chloride compared to regular salt alone when cooking, Greger says. For 100% potassium versions, you might get a slightly metallic taste, so it works better in some foods than others, he adds. Another bonus: Most Americans don’t get enough potassium in their diet, so this is one way to boost that mineral. The main caveat is for people with kidney failure who must limit potassium in their diets.
- Look into lower-salt eating plans. Following certain low-sodium diets or eating plans will help you keep sodium levels in check. The DASH diet, which stands for dietary approaches to stop hypertension, is a great choice for emphasizing low-salt, healthy foods. The Mediterranean diet has been shown to be moderate in sodium, as well, Palmer notes. “It’s based on whole, minimally processed foods,” she says. “And plant-based diets can be low in sodium.”
Watching Salt While Eating Out
Whether you’re dining out or ordering carryout, restaurant meals can contain hidden sodium. Here’s what to do:
- Check restaurant websites in advance. While larger chain restaurants now post calorie counts directly on the menu, you’ll have to dig a little deeper for nutrients like sodium or saturated fats. However, smaller, local restaurants aren’t required to reveal that information, Ussery notes. So you may have to be proactive in other ways.
- Keep an eye on portions. “I would be very mindful of portion sizes at a restaurant,” Ussery says, both in general and in terms of limiting specific nutrients like sodium.
- Talk to your server. An experienced server might be able to steer you away from higher-salt foods on the menu.
- Ask for dressing and sauces on the side. Serving dressing on the side instead of mixed into a salad is now common with so many calorie-conscious diners. It also helps you control salt consumption. Or, you can ask for balsamic vinegar and oil to mix a simple salad dressing on your own, Ussery says. Sauces in restaurants can also be high in sodium, so you may want to ask for sauce on the side, as well.
- Order less pizza. Pizza is like the perfect storm for sodium. “Pizza is a huge offender,” Palmer says. “Because salt is in the crust, it’s in the sauce, it’s in the toppings. It can be dramatically high. And people eat a lot of pizza in America. If you’re eating it once or twice a week, that whole meal can be really high in sodium.”
- Dine out less. Eating out is a “lost cause” when it comes to limiting sodium, Greger says. “You basically just kind of have to throw your hands up in the air and encourage people to cook as much as they can so they have control over their food,” he says. It doesn’t matter which cuisine you favor, whether it’s Italian, Ethiopian, Indian or other, he maintains: Restaurants will serve up food laden with fat, sugar and salt to lure customers back with the taste.
For Ussery, a take-home message is: “Just try to get into the kitchen to cook more.” That puts you in charge of everything including sodium, calories and saturated fat, she says. “It’s really such a good way to take control of your health.”
Palmer says you can train your taste buds to crave less salt. “If people could just realize: There’s so much flavor in food without the salt, if you’re eating a colorful diet and using spices, herbs and citrus,” she says. “So you can use nature’s seasonings that are good for you to help you reduce salt and learn to really love food for what it is – without the salt kind of masking it.”
Your salt sensitivity can change for the better, Greger agrees. “If you take people and put them on a low-salt diet, at first everything tastes like cardboard,” he admits. “But, then an amazing thing happens. Week after week, if you give them soup and then have them salt it for taste, week after week, the amount of salt they like goes down.”
The ideal, Greger says, is to “get to a point where you’re eating so healthfully, with so little processed food, that corn on the cob, no salt, no butter, actually tastes delicious.”
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