Rule 34 – Sweeten and Salt Your Food Yourself.

“Whether soups or cereals or soft drinks,” says Pollan, “foods and beverages that have been prepared by corporations contain far higher levels of salt and sugar than any ordinary human would ever add–even a child. By sweetening and salting these foods yourself, you’ll make them to your taste, and you will fine you’re consuming a fraction as much sugar and salt as you otherwise would” (75). Obviously if we’re to sweeten and salt our foods ourselves, we need to make them at home in the first place, and that’s a wonderful thing because then you can control not just sugar and salt but also the quality and quantity of all ingredients. When I make cookies, for example, even just using a standard cookie recipe, I use only organic ingredients, and I replace half the butter with olive or grape seed oil, and half the flour with whole wheat or some other whole grain flour. I’ve also found that I can often reduce the sugar content without adversely affecting the flavor. All good things!

Here’s an interesting article on the issue of Americans’ salt consumption from CNN:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/01/21/salt.intake/index.html

The tips are courtesy of Michael Pollan’s book Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual. New York: Penguin, 2009.

Happy, Healthy Eating!