After stockpiling 3–6 months of can goods, I find out I am salt sensitive…..does anyone have suggestions on which packaged foods would have less sodium. Freeze dried, Dehydrated,etc?
I’ve been concerned about the sodium content of packaged food. We wouldn’t normally be eating packaged food. I’ve kept this in mind whenever I buy preps but I believe the best way is to buy basic foods that require preparation and cooking and add your own sodium quantity. Even though I’ve said that I do have canned goods with sodium which I’ll have to use sparingly. I think you may want to dehydrate or can your own food so you can control sodium as well.
Walmart has their own house brand of canned fruits and vegetables that are no salt and sugar added. Plain dry pasta, rice and beans are typically no salt. I also have to prep low salt and I’m with you - 90% of what’s out there I can’t have. Goodbye cans of chili, soup, pasta, Hamburger Helper, soy sauce, Rice-a-Roni, Lawry & McCormick packaged spice mixes. (Although McCormick does have a low sodium chili seasoning mix if you can find it - your doctor would probably still consider it too salty). If you’re on a low salt diet, it’s 2000 mgs of sodium or less. That’s a little more than 1 can of chili, depending on the brand. 15 −16 oz cans are usually described as “2 1/2 servings,” so do the math. You’re better off prepping with scratch ingredients and a heat source.
There is low sodium canned tuna - Starkist makes one (Walmart), also Trader Joe’s has a couple that are very reasonable. Trader Joe’s also has a lot of no salt packaged nuts and other foods. If there isn’t one nearby, try the local health food store. Lay in some low sodium saltine crackers - not the unsalted tops, they are more salty. Frozen veggies are usually no salt added - check the label.
Whole Foods and similar stores have low salt soups and chilis, but they are tasteless beyond belief. If you’re going to go that way, make up A LOT of homemade seasoning mix (or pay a fortune to get a large quantity of ready made), because you’re going to need it. Also, experiment ahead of time - with some of this stuff, nothing can make it edible but salt. Use chili powder, pepper, curry, cinnamon or other hot spices instead - but many curry and chili powder brands have salt in them, so check the label. Also, buy little cans of Hatch (it’s lower salt than many) or Macayo diced chilies, and toss them in soups and stews. If you must use salt in pasta or soups, don’t cook any in at all. Don’t shake it on either - pinch a few grains in your hand and sprinkle it over the top. You’ll taste it and it’s a very small amount. After several weeks you’ll discover that each kind of food has a separate taste - unlike now when every single thing you eat is salt flavored. It takes a while to get used to it.
If you bake - you must use salt in order to get breads, cakes or cookies to rise, so buy some “low sodium” salt or salt substitute. If you have some time now, make up dried soup mixes and can them or store in glass jars.
Another thing I’m doing right now is buying bulk spices and making my own no-salt spice mixes in quantity - I will use them sip or not, since I have to cook from scratch so much. Sam’s Club has good prices for bulk spices. Look for spice mixes on the net, then make them without the salt. Check the sodium content of every spice before you buy. Check out Mexican food brands - lower salt for the exact same products.
saltfreelife.com has a “Community” section where you can view recipes without a subscription. Recipelink.com has a lot of stuff. Search for soup mixes and homemade seasoning mixes. Also, try allrecipes.com, fooddownunder.com.
If anybody else knows of sources for low salt packaged foods, I’m all ears!
Your best bet is to try and cook as much as you can from scratch. Of a persona’s total salt in-take, most of it is from pre-packed and rest. food. Very little comes from using the salt shaker at home. Since you won’t be eating out if SIP, this will help a lot. Search out low-salt/no salt products - there are plenty out there, from flavorings for veggies, etc. to low-salt soy salt. Also, if you are making something like pre-packaged flavored rice (eg. Rice-A-Roni) add half the package - you won’t miss the salt at all. You can also flavor rice with low/no-salt boullion cubes. They are more expensive but regular boullion cubes are just blocks of salt with a hint of flavor added. Also experiemnt with using lots of other spices to add flavor to food without using salt. Read labels carefully - even cereal has a lot of sodium.
This might help:
It lists links to the nutrition labels of popular canned goods, providing a quick way to find the sodium content.
Also, in the left column are links to similar pages for foods other than canned goods.
located a good site for low sodium foods at www.shoplowsodium.com
I finally got Mountain House to send me their product content list, and most of their products (except fruits)are high in sodium per serving, around 800 milligrams plus!
When deciding to add FD and Dehydrated foods to my mix of preps that is the first thing I noticed, the sodium content in almost all entrees is through the roof, not to mention that most also are made with some kind of dairy, a problem for those with lactose intolerance. Accordingly I have kept those to a minimum, buying just a few cans of AlpineAire FD entrees and some MREs. The rest of my reserves are basic vegetable and fruits, chicken, beef and turkey with no sodium. Some things I have tried have so much salt that my head feels like it will explode. Have tried contacting some of these manufacturers but get either no answer or words to the effect that “our customers prefer it”. Do not know why they can not cut the sodium down and let people add some if they need or want it. Have taken to not buying high sodium goods, or looking for the few that are lower in salt content. One example I found is in hot sauces which I love to add to many foods, they are usually high in sodium, but found one, and I am sure there are others, that is very low in salt, Cholula, from Mexico, that has about 20MG per tsp compared to 100 or more for others. Easy to spot, has a wooden cap! One thing I have noticed, for instance in buying salsa, when the quality is high, very little salt is needed, when low, the high sodium content covers the flavor flaws.
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