Sodium, Sodium, Sodium

rebijord

I was recently diagnosed with high blood pressure/cholesterol and was wondering what I can eat throughout the day that is both filling enough and keeps it below 1500 mg of sodium. Also is low in carbs.

ElizabethOakes2

I have my sodium set at 1300 mg here and manage to nail it most days. I think I'm a bit over today because I had sandwich meat and feta cheese for lunch and then made canned beans for dinner. (Even if you rinse beans, they're still pretty high.)

Head down to the supermarket and check out your options for salt-free seasonings! I use a TON of them, and each of them has different flavors. I like the Safeway All Purpose for scrambled eggs and in tuna salad, the McCormick's Southern Smoky for pork and chicken, and the garlic pepper and lemon pepper for all kinds of things.

If you're a soup person, get a crockpot! Canned soups, even the 'lower sodium' ones, are insanely high in sodium. make a crockpot full of chicken soup with fresh veggies and herbs, using salt free seasonings, then freeze it in the little containers for 'soup on the go'.

You can oven roast boneless skinless chicken breast with salt-free seasonings and slice it for sandwiches or to put on salads. High protein, low carb, and SO easy! I usually hit the good sales at Lucky's or Safeway and do a whole bunch in different flavors, then slice them up and freeze them in ziplocks, so I can just pull out a serving at a time.

Sweet potatoes, butternut squash, acorn squash, etc, aren't necessarily low-carb, but better than white potato and the potassium is supposed to help with the high blood pressure. Just don't dump a ton of butter on them. I like a little sweet balsamic vinegar on them.

feisty_bucket

NuSalt is actually potassium, but tastes salty. I use a lot of this stuff on my foodz:
nusalt.com/

Yi5hedr3

Minimize all processed foods. Increase Potassium.

beemerphile1

First off, not everyone who is hypertensive reacts to sodium so you will need to do some experimenting.

Most of the sodium in our diets comes from processed, packaged, and fast foods. If you can stay more with foods from the meat department and produce department you will have minimal amounts of sodium in your food. This will mean extra work on your part because you will need to prepare your own foods.

Any canned, boxed, or prepackaged foods, read the labels.