The great salt scandal
Nutrition Team
Reaching for the salt cellar is a life-long habit for many of us. It’s hard to imagine how a scattering of tiny white grains could be harmful but eating too much salt can contribute to high blood pressure which in turn can lead to heart disease, kidney disease and stroke. The combination of a high salt intake and overweight is a particularly strong risk factor for heart disease, so reaching a healthy weight as well as checking your salt intake could really make a difference to your health.
And it’s not just adults who are taking in too much salt. The FSA recently launched new guidelines for children’s salt intake. Think of the foods that most kids love – crisps, pasta shapes, pizza, fish fingers and ketchup and those handy packed lunches. These foods are all loaded with salt, pushing the average child’s salt intake well over the recommended levels.
Yes, we do need some salt in our diet – sodium plays a role in transmitting nerve signals, muscle function and water balance and we need salt for the absorption of food from the gut. It can make food taste better and has been used as a preservative for centuries.
But on average, each adult takes 9g or 2 tsp of salt (sodium chloride) every day (1g of salt equals 393mg of sodium), while we only need 1 tsp or 6g of salt per day. Children’s salt intake is also at worrying high levels. The Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition daily salt intake recommendations for children are:
• 12 months or younger, less than 1g
• 1-3 years, 2g
• 4-6 years, 3g
• 7-10 years, 5g
• Older children aged 11 and over have the same 6g guideline as adults.
Children’s salt intake is often double these recommended levels.
Unfortunately, cutting down on salt is easier said than done as so much salt is now ‘hidden’ in foods, added by the manufacturers.
Here are some of the worst – and most unexpected – culprits on the salt front:
Children’s food
• Those convenient Dairylea Lunchables that kids love pack up to 2.75g of salt in a portion. That exceeds the daily limit for toddlers and doesn’t leave a lot left over for other children…
• Pasta shapes in tomato sauce can also contain up to 2.75g salt in a serving
• An individual pizza can have over 1g salt
• Chicken nuggets and chips provide around 0.8g salt per serving
Meat and fish
• Each slice of bacon contains 1.2g salt or a fifth of the daily adult allowance
• For every sausage you pop in the grill, you give yourself 1g salt
• A 150g fillet of smoked haddock or 60g of smoked salmon each contain 4.5g salt
Groceries
• Ready meals can contain almost 6g – the full daily recommended intake – in one serving
• One small tin of baked beans contains as much as 3g salt. No-added salt baked beans contain about 2/3 of this amount
• Cereal is good for you, right? Well, it can be a great source of fibre if you choose the wholegrain varieties and many are fortified with vitamins and minerals. However, when it comes to the salt content, you do have to be careful. Taking cornflakes as an example, a 40g serving will provide you with a gram of salt
• Watch out for instant and tinned soups. 100g chicken soup mix contains around 8 grams of salt while a 245g tin of soup can contain as much as 4.5 g salt
• The salt content of crisps varies greatly depending on the brand and flavour – an average bag 0.7g salt but this can rise to almost 3g in Twiglets or Pringles
• Are you sprinkling salt in your chips AND dipping them in tomato ketchup? For every 10ml you use, you add 0.25g salt.
• Bread can add a serious amount of salt to your diet, with an average slice of white bread providing 0.45g salt.
• While stir frying is a healthy way to cook, if you liberally shake the soy sauce on your noodles and veg, you could be doing some damage in terms of increasing your salt intake. There are 0.5g salt in each teaspoon of soy sauce.
• Eating plenty of salad vegetables is a really healthy way to eat but it’s worth reading the label on your dressing - Caesar salad dressing can contain up to a gram of salt per serving.
• Cake is not something that immediately springs to mind as salty but Madeira cake contains nearly a gram of salt per 100g.
We have only highlighted a few foods here but there are many more. Be careful to read the nutritional information on food labels before you buy.
How to reduce your intake
• Don’t add salt in cooking.
• Try to get out of the habit of adding salt to food at the table. Use an alternative ‘low sodium’ product. These are usually based on potassium chloride instead of sodium chloride.
• Cut down on salty snack foods like crisps and salted peanuts.
• Buy tinned vegetables and beans marked ‘no added salt’.
• Cut down on salted meats like bacon, sausages and ham.
• Stock cubes are very salty. Try making your own stock instead.
• Watch sauces, especially soy sauce and foods containing monosodium glutamate.
• Use fewer tinned and packet soups – go for homemade instead.
• Choose fresh or frozen vegetables instead of tinned.
• Marinade food before cooking – fruit juices or vinegar, fresh herbs, garlic and chilli all work well, or you can use low fat salad dressing or a bottled marinade.
• Add spices to soups, stews and casseroles or sprinkle over meat or veggies before cooking.
• Be generous with herbs! Add dried herbs during cooking to allow them to soften and toss fresh herbs into dishes just before serving. You can use one quarter of the amount of dried herbs to fresh.
• Add lemon or lime juice for extra bite.
• Balsamic vinegar can be added to many dishes, especially pasta, rice and creamy dishes.
• A teaspoon of Bovril or marmite will add lots of flavour with much less sodium than a stock cube.