A blood-pressure-lowering diet does not have to be tasteless and bland. First, there are salt substitutes that, once you get used to them, are a viable alternative to salt. They do take a little getting used to, though, and some are definitely better than others. You do have to become an expert label reader. There is hidden salt everywhere in processed foods. Don’t let that sodium sneak into your diet.
There are, however, ways in which you can spice up your blood-pressure-lowering diet with spices other than salt. You need to buy a low-sodium cookbook and adjust your favorite recipes. You can buy salt-free spice blends and experiment with new recipes. There are spice combinations, such as the Mrs. Dash line, The Spice Hunter, and Spices of the World, that rely on garlic, onion, and pepper for flavor, and sometimes there are additions of more exotic spices.
The idea is to keep the food and the flavor, but to lose the salt. The salt shaker that resides on your dinner table is actually the least of the problem. A low-salt diet usually consists of an allowance of about 1,000 grams of salt per day. A little sprinkle of salt is only about 50 grams. Several shakes is probably less than 100 grams.
The guilty party as far as excess salt in the diet is concerned is always processed foods, and convenience foods (frozen dinners, for example) are the worst of the worst. Read labels — you will be amazed at the amount of sodium in some foods that don’t even taste salty. You will need to prepare your meals at home. You will need to buy fresh vegetables and uncooked meat, take them home and prepare them without adding too much salt so you can control your intake of sodium and help to control your high blood pressure.
