Low Salt Diet

Party_Animal

Apologies if this is in the wrong place.
Despite my fairly healthy lifestyle ( with the exception of exceeding my weekly units) I've been diagnosed with high blood pressure and it likely I'll be prescribed medication. I saw the Practice Nurse today and she agreed that, on the whole, my diet is ok but I need to cut down on salt. I don't use salt in cooking or seasoning, I think the problem lies in processed food. We make our own soups etc and try to eat lots of fresh stuff, but we do use tinned beans and tomatoes etc. The nurse told me that there's as much salt in corn flakes as crisps. Does anyone have any advice as to which foods or brands are low in salt?
Thanks any advice very welcome
Thanks again

Sarahsaver

I was in a health food shop today stocking up on porridge;) and that is salt free! Get cereals in their purest unadulterated form and they will be better for you in terms of salt content - nil, and also better for fibres.
Ditch the processed food, you will be fine then. Do it gradually and it will be a doddle.
I saw a dietitian after I had a stroke. I wasn't over weight and i did not have an unhealthy diet. They are trained to look for problems and will find them even if there are none. She tried to pin my .5 % raised cholesterol - yes half a percent over normal level - on the fact that i SOMETIMES had a hot chocolate and i SOMETIMES had a biscuit with it. Not because I had at the time already been in hospital 2 weeks eating hospital food when they did the test:(

The_Biff

Salt can lower your blood pressure (Lancet article - way back), but not the table salt we use today. It has been processed too much, too many additives eg anti-caking chemicals, whiteners, iodine etc..
What works is organic sea salt. It may not be as white as table salt but does contain the necessary natural minerals in trace quantities. Use in moderation.
I've also read that porridge lowers BP as well.

in_my_wellies

Don't use the Lo Salt as an alternative to 'normal' salt. My husband had very high blood pressure and tried to change his diet. I bought this but then he failed the kidney function test which he has to have as a result of the high BP. We could not understand why the potasium level had gone up but then discovered it was the change in salt. Now we have got used to going without.
Good luck

margaret_3

Ooops! We use the Lo Salt occasionally ---- just a little when boiling potatoes but I didn't realise that there was something wrong with it.
We neither of us have high blood pressure but thought it healthier to do away with as much salt as possible. However, I'm not so sure about Lo Salt now after reading the above post.
Margaret

DingDong_3

I eat shredded wheat precisely because it has only 'trace' sodium. It's rather expensive though. I used to eat cornflakes until I discovered the salt content! Porridge is great too but I can never be bothered making it!

suki1964

We cut salt out about a year ago and now we find if difficult to eat anthing other then whats been home cooked due to the saltiness. Even meals from our favourte indian resturant have dissapointed us because of how salty everything now tastes

Anything that is proccessed is laden with salt. A loaf of shop bought bread has 5 teaspoons of salt in it compared to one in a homemade loaf

You may find this calculator helpful when trying to find low salt products http://www.salt.gov.uk/cgi-bin/saltcalc.pl

Anne_Marie_2

DingDong wrote:

I eat shredded wheat precisely because it has only 'trace' sodium. It's rather expensive though. I used to eat cornflakes until I discovered the salt content! Porridge is great too but I can never be bothered making it!

Used to be the same as couldn't be bothered making porridge, and hated cleaning the pot - yeugh!. Now done in bowl in microwave, only takes about 3 mins, and its so much easier to clean pyrex bowl. If only making for me, I just use my normal cereal bowl to save on washing up, being a right lazy one! Only thing is, I add salt to my porridge, but you can always add sugar or honey (what sacrilege is this coming from a Scottish mouth here!).

If you get the chance to get a load of tomatoes cheaply at a market, why not make up a big batch of tomato sauce and freeze in suitable sized portions. Or oven roast the tomatoes to bring out the flavour, then make tomato sauce.

Sorry can't help you with low salt cereals apart from porridge, as we don't eat them. Similarly no help with processed foods, as I really only buy tins of tomatoes, and didn't realize until recently how high the salt content is (approx. 0.4g per tin). Anyone else found low salt content tinned tomatoes, otherwise it will have to be done the hard (but more healthy) way!

Party_Animal

Thanks very much for all your help. I'm off to make some porridge.

Party_Animal

suki1964 wrote:

We cut salt out about a year ago and now we find if difficult to eat anthing other then whats been home cooked due to the saltiness. Even meals from our favourte indian resturant have dissapointed us because of how salty everything now tastes

Anything that is proccessed is laden with salt. A loaf of shop bought bread has 5 teaspoons of salt in it compared to one in a homemade loaf

You may find this calculator helpful when trying to find low salt products http://www.salt.gov.uk/cgi-bin/saltcalc.pl

Thanks Suki, the link didn't work. It took me to a Microsoft Direct X link.

Lillibet_2

I grew up on a salt free diet as my grandad lived with us & he had 4 heart attacks, angina (Sp?) & 4 heart bypass operations & had to have a low salt/low cholestral diet. I find it quite hard to eat most processed foods beacuase I find them so salty. The one exce[tion is takeaway pizza which I love but find myself drinking pints of water afterwards. It really isn't that hard to cut out salt, it takes around a month to get used to it but once you do you won't want to go back : you can taste the natural flavour of the foods again! You can always subsitite a few herbs whlist you get used to the taste.
I agree that any kind of processed food is the worst offender & contains far more than you woud normally add in any cooking. It really is back to basics. Unadultarated food products or only those with trace sodium I'm afraid.