Category: Salt

Health promotion · Healthy Eating · Salt

Should we go nuts this Christmas?

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A systematic review of the evidence found in 20 studies (29 publications) by researchers at Imperial College London published today in BioMed Central revealed statistically significant reductions in risk of diseases such as cancer, stroke, coronary heart disease and diabetes in people who ate more than 20g a day of nuts.

Whilst there could be a number of factors associated with this reduction in risk, it puts nuts in a positive light. So, don’t assume that nuts are magic pills when your diet is otherwise very unbalanced diet and you do very little physical activity.

If you are going to be eating more nuts this Christmas though, make sure they are not salted ones or you could increase your risk of hypertension in the process! Nuts covered in chocolate fall into the sweets category so also not a recommended regular snack.

For the full study, click here

CASH · Chef · Health promotion · Healthy Eating · Salt

Too much salt

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Have you ever gone out for a meal or had a takeaway and then not been able to get a good night’s sleep because you keep waking up thirsty? As we try and cut down on the amount of salt we are putting in our food at home, many restaurants are still keeping the salt in their food.

This week is Salt Awareness Week. CASH have just published new research which found:

Five of the top saltiest main meals [portion size stated where known]:

1. JD Wetherspoons’ [10oz gammon with eggs, chips, peas, tomato & flat mushroom] = 8.9g salt per portion
2. Jamie’s Italian [game meatball] = 8.1g salt per 570g portion
3. Carluccio’s [spaghetti alle vongole in bianco] = 8.0g
4. Gordon Ramsay’s The Savoy Grill’s [steamed mussels cider cream sauce and fries] = 7.3g salt per 510g portion
5. Wagamama’s Yaki Udon = 7.0g salt per 620g portion

Check out this page for more details of the report

 

Is this really what we want to be doing to our bodies when we go out for food. Some of those dishes probably cost a fair amount too. Perhaps we, the consumer, should start to put pressure on our top chefs and big chains to change from the old fashioned we use sea salt rather than table/rock salt message to using their skills and knowledge of herbs and spices and other ingredients to improve flavour. I have been up for the challenge of reducing salt without cutting flavour, are they?