Nutrition labels. You should read them.

I've become intimately familiar with them in the last year due to health. Maybe you are too or just want to cut back on certain things. I have to watch out for sodium and sugars. There were many surprises. We'll go with sodium for this. There's sodium in damn near everything, even milk. Check the labels for content. Soup is good for you right? Most canned soup, most canned goods actually, are loaded with sodium. Campbell's tomato soup:



That's for half a can. See the serving portion at the top. So for a full can you're looking at about half of the daily recommendation in one can. Always check the portion or you may get more than you think. Kraft Mac and Cheese:



That's 1/3 of your daily in 1/3 of a box. AVOID SOY SAUCE. YOUR DAILY IN 1 TABLESPOON.

This applies to everything. Sugars. Cholesterol, etc. It also works if you want to add something. Iron, fiber, vitamins, etc.

And don't trust that just because it comes from the same product line that the ingredients are the same. Steamers:



The sodium in those range from 330mg to over 1000. It only takes a couple of seconds to check. Know what your eating. I hope this helps.

a reply to: intrepid


That's because sodium/salt is used as a preservative.

Really want to stay away from spam then.

a reply to: intrepid

My mom had to watch her sodium (salt) intake while she was in the hospital, too. She complained the food was tasteless because of lack of salt. Inside the hospital the limit placed on salt is much higher, because of their policy. Most people get waaay too much and thats part of their overall health problems when they arrive, so they cut way back in prepared meals.

After she got out, the doctors told her that up to 2500 milligrams (Mgs) of sodium a day are acceptable under 'normal' circumstances.

The labels reflecting a thousand and above are to be avoided. Same with salt shakers, avoid doing the shaka-shaka on your food before eating.

Sodium occurs in most every food, the body needs a certain amount of it. Same with Potassium, the other salt.

a reply to: intrptr
I was put on a low sodium diet 5 years ago. 1000 mg per day.

The first few weeks everything tasted different.
Now, most of the processed food and some restaurant food tastes way too salty for me.

At times I miss it when I eat. Popcorn mostly.

a reply to: intrepid


Heart problems run on my dads side of the family. When I was a wittle kid I remember he couldn't eat salt. So I took it upon myself to not put salt on anything. My wife always ask me why I don't put salt on anything and I tell her everything pretty much has salt in it.
I also remember he had to take an 81mg aspirin so I started doing that when I was in my late 20s. I also made the Dr. put me on high blood pressure medicine. I told him it is better to be pro active than reactive.
My 2 pennies.........

a reply to: intrepid

I had my gallbladder out. I was on an iv with no water or food for a week. After that everything tasted and smelled different. I could literally taste the chemicals in food. Many foods that aren't spicy tasted spicy to me. Gatorade tasted spicy! I think our food is so engineered and we are so used to them we don't know what real food taste like anymore.

a reply to: intrepid

Yep. Youre absolutely right. FYI: usually on liquids the 1st ingredient is the main one. Like juices, sports drinks etc.

ie: Filter Water...means its mostly water...not juice.

P.S. Hey Intrepid? I read the ingredient last night on a bottle of Kosher, coarse grain salt. Zero calories...but 440 mgs per 1/4 TEA-spoon of SODIUM!

Peace...MS

USRDA is complete bull-shart in my opinion.
If it looks good, eat it.
Cut back on the grains and sugars if your ass is getting fat.

a reply to: skunkape23

There's always one. Pfft. I'll come to your funeral.

originally posted by: abago71
a reply to: intrptr
I was put on a low sodium diet 5 years ago. 1000 mg per day.

The first few weeks everything tasted different.
Now, most of the processed food and some restaurant food tastes way too salty for me.

At times I miss it when I eat. Popcorn mostly.

You must have problems wth hypertension, hi blood pressure. Salt hardens arteries, restricts blood flow, makes the heart work harder.

I love popcorn too. I rarely indulge, when I do I eat "Pop Secret, Lite". Has around 300 mg sodium.

a reply to: intrepid

First rule of eating healthy: avoid processed foods. They are all junk, even the ones in the health food section. If you desire processed foods I've found Newman's to be a really good brand and clearly marked when all natural and/or organic. Plus, all profits go to charity and therefore the prices are usually pretty good.

I've worked in the food industry off and on for over a decade now.

Sodium is the taste enhancer.

If people found out how much sodium is in a pasta dish at any restaurant they'd most likely never eat pasta again.

As for grocery store foods, anything that isn't in the fresh fruits and veggies, cheese / bakery section or within 30 feet of the butchers section, it's processed.

originally posted by: skunkape23
USRDA is complete bull-shart in my opinion.
If it looks good, eat it.
Cut back on the grains and sugars if your ass is getting fat.

I actually agree with this. They're both very inflammatory.
It's also easy to not get enough salt, if you're eating a lot of salads and not salting anything. I was accidentally down to about a third of the necessary requirements, had a headache for about a month til I realized it. Ate a big bag of chips - headache finally went away.
Just don't overdo the salt.
Sugar also causes high blood pressure.

a reply to: snowspirit

The recommended maximum for a healthy person is 2500mg/day. That changes with health problems though. I was cut back to 1000 before the transplant. I'm allowed 2000 now.

a reply to: intrepid

I counted all the sodium counts that day that I found out that I might not be getting enough. I was at around 500 to 600 a day. Now I salt the odd thing.
I upped my salt and lowered my sugar, and my blood pressure normalized as well. It was high , but I think that was the sugar

It works the other way too. Need more fiber? Check it when choosing a product.

a reply to: intrepid

I generally read labels, partly for the two items you mentioned, salt and sugar, and partly because I like to buy things that are as pure/natural and with as few ingredients as possible, depending on what I buy.

I know that salt is added to damn near everything frozen, canned, and boxed for "taste" and as a preservative (and that's one reason I refuse to eat Campbell's), but what gets me is the insane amount of added sugar in everything. That's what I avoid at all costs. Aside from fresh and/or organic stuff, I try to pick products with as few, as pure, and as "natural" products as possible. I never buy frozen dinners/entrees/etc, the occasional frozen pizza, or frozen ravioli, very few boxed snacks (although I *will* indulge in tater chips) that are, at least whole grain, or brown rice, etc.

Then again, one of the reasons for added sugar is because it essentially gets people "hooked." There's a pretty good National Geographic article on sugar.

Added sugar, added sugar, added sugar, I don't want added sugar!

People definitely need to pay more attention to what they put in their bodies.

Learn to look for hidden sugars. Food companies work at hiding sweet products.
And some of them may not even be in the nutrirional list of sugars.

Read the ingredients list. Learn to identify terms that mean added sugars, including sugar, white sugar, brown sugar, confectioner’s sugar, corn syrup, dextrin, honey, invert sugar, maple syrup, raw sugar, beet sugar, cane sugar, corn sweeteners, evaporated cane juice, high fructose corn syrup, malt, molasses, and turbinado sugar, to name a few.

www.sparkpeople.com...

With HFCS, labels have become deceptive about it:

How do General Mills and other Big Food companies navigate such issues? Bill Bonvie, writing for Food Identity Theft, notes that corn refiners are:

“simply eliminating the high fructose corn syrup designation for the laboratory sweetener that’s nine-tenths fructose and calling it what it really is: fructose. And that’s how a processed-food product like Vanilla Chex that contains “fructose”, a substance that, according to the corn refiners, used to be called HFCS-90, can now declare itself to be high fructose corn syrup-free.” k

Source

a reply to: dreamingawake

MSG has a similar sneakiness....
www.truthinlabeling.org...
It gets rather technical.....but basically:

Only if there is no (zero) free glutamic acid in an end product can one legitimately claim that there is no MSG. The burden of proof for a claim about the absence of MSG must lie with those making the claim.

Other things to be wary of on packaging......gluten free, lightly sweetened, all natural....sneaky come ons that making reading the nutrition label important.
www.health.com...-with-real-fruit-0