Durban - The least noticed but most vitally important report of the year has been the American call for an urgent reduction of salt intake – which their department of health believes can avert more than 200 000 deaths a year from heart attacks and strokes.
South African health authorities have reported that at least 6.3 million people are living with dangerously high blood pressure and that at least 130 heart attacks and 240 strokes are occurring daily here.
Because of our poor health reporting facilities, these statistics don’t tell a complete picture.
The US Institute of Health – backed by the government – is calling for a national campaign to cut salt intake to a maximum of 2 325mg, a limit that could save the US 200 000 deaths from salt in the next decade.
But every urban developed community in the world – including ours – is suffering from the same overdosing of salt in processed food and domestic use.
Most healthy people absorb around 1 500mg of salt a day, with an upper limit of 2 300mg. But the average eater gets around 3 600mg, mostly through processed fast foods, together with their excesses of sugar and saturated fats – as well as sprinkling extra salt on much of their food.
And that much salt becomes a silent killer.
A month ago we got two very personal warnings. Clare, my wife, went for her annual check-up. Among her results: high blood pressure. Prescription: a no-salt diet to be followed by a minimal salt diet.
Within a couple of weeks, I went for my check-up. Yep, high blood pressure, very high, in fact. So I went to work on the problem: no salt in cooking, no sprinkling, no processed foods. Even a shortbread biscuit contains salt. Salads? The commercial dressings are loaded with the stuff – stick to the oil, lemon juice and black pepper mix.
Bread varies from enough salt to too much, and “artisan” bakers tend to salt heavily. Fish and chips is a fairly healthy meal if properly cooked and drained. But that heavy sprinkle from the perforated 240g salt shaker poisons it.
This was the first and easiest step to take with determination. Nearly 80 percent of the salt we urban eaters absorb comes from processed foods.
The British government’s health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, is heading a persuasion campaign to make supermarket processed foods safer with reduced sugar, salt and saturated fats. Don’t expect such a campaign here.
The solution to the second stage of the corrective campaign – severely limited salt – must be personal. Living with it is difficult but there are solutions. The discipline of minimising salt use was especially irritating for me until I found The Ration Pot: a little transparent plastic cup with an airtight lid which I placed on the working counter.
When we got to the minimal salt stage I went for the US recommended level. I put two level teaspoons of salt in it – each measuring close to 2 325mg – as a daily allowance for both of us. That’s a full ration for all cooking and no sprinkling. If we have to eat out, we lessen the ration for the day.
I found it a great help to see the day’s allowance when doling it out in meagre pinches and sprinkles. But this measure needs flavour reinforcing.
The main thrust is finding, making and sticking to alternative seasoning flavours. You have to find substitutes for salt’s strong flavour.
As I’ve mentioned, fresh lemon juice is a powerful antidote to salt craving and it gets more powerful if you add the zest from the outer lemon peel.
I found quite a few internet sources of low-salt recipes and almost no salt-free recipes. But most of them depend to varying extents on processed flavourants – depending on manufactured “onion powder” and other attempts at vegetable flavours which, when you read some of the labels, are as salt free as Marmite.
It may have reduced its salt-base significantly over the years but it has no place in a low-salt diet.
Don’t write off monosodium glutamate, or MSG, because of those years-ago rumours that it reduced people to nervous twitching wrecks. MSG is a natural product found in large amounts in edible seaweeds. But a lot of manufacturers used to mix it with large amounts of salt to give it an immediate taste base.
I have never met anyone who has suffered from the rumoured MSG allergy, despite consuming truckloads of Chinese and Japanese foods over the years. I suspect it was sold heavily laced with salt to reduce costs, and the cheap make-weight salt was the cause of the trouble.
Use pure MSG as you would use chilli powder: in small amounts to enhance flavours, not to provide them.
These home-made flavour mixtures to replace salt are wide-ranging and versatile in catering to all tastes. I’ve tried several and settled on three, one them my own mix. Try changing the flavours to suit your own tastes in getting the salt monkey off your back.
A ZESTY STARTER SALT SUBSTITUTE
3 tbs dried oregano
3 tbs garlic powder
1½ tbs paprika
1½ tsp English mustard powder
2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp dried dill
Grind all the ingredients together in a little electric coffee grinder (they’re cheap) or a pestle and mortar. Store in the fridge to give the flavours long life – in an airtight container you can bring to the table.
ANOTHER RICHER COMBINATION
1 tbs garlic powder
1 tbs chopped orange peel zest
1 tbs arrowroot powder
1 tsp treacle sugar
2 tbs ground black pepper
2 tbs celery seed
2 tbs onion powder
2 tbs cream of tartar
2 tsps citric acid powder
1 tsp ground dill seed
1 tsp ground white pepper
Half a tsp chilli powder
Again, grind together in an electric grinder or a pestle and mortar.
MY FLAVOUR MIX
This takes a little longer to make but the livelier, fresher flavours involved make it worthwhile and it creates 24 servings for cooking or table use. Also, it is sometimes difficult to find manufactured onion and garlic powders without hunting down a specialist spice shop. This mix is easy to get together and you can use it in cooking or on the side of your plate.
1 heaped tsp each of:
dried oregano,
parsley
thyme
basil
sage
3 medium onions
6 garlic cloves
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground mace
1 tsp ground black pepper
A good pinch of chilli powder
Optional: 1 tsp MSG powder
Method: Peel and finely mince the onions and garlic. Mix thoroughly with all the other ingredients. Lightly brush an oven tray with oil. Place tray in a pre-heated 100ºC oven for about 15 minutes. You want the mixture to dry but not bake. Scrape the dried mixture off the oven tray and process thoroughly in a processor or blender. Keep it in an airtight container in the fridge and dole out the required amount for the table or recipe as needed. Try rubbing the mixture into chops and fish fillets before cooking.
Here is a good salt-free recipe which will give an idea of how these spicy flavour substitutes work.
ONE-POT MOROCCAN CHICKEN
For 4 or 5.
4 full chicken breasts, skinned and separated
3 tbs vegetable oil
100g chopped tomatoes
100g fresh ginger, scraped and chopped
6 garlic cloves, sliced finely
1 tsp each ground turmeric and cumin
Zest and juice from one lemon
Pinches of coriander (dhania) cinnamon and black pepper
Heat 2 tbs of the oil in a lidded, oven casserole dish. Put the chopped onion, tomato, garlic, ginger, lemon zest in the dish and stir-fry for five minutes or until contents start to brown. Remove from the oven and add the turmeric and cumin. Stir in the pinches of dhania, cinnamon and black pepper.
In a frying pan, heat the remaining tablespoons of oil and increase heat. Fry the chicken breasts, turning them as they begin to colour until they are lightly browned. Add to the casserole and mix well with contents. Add the lemon juice and stir again.
Cover and cook in a 180ºC oven for 30 minutes. Give a final stir to coat the chicken. - Sunday Tribune