Reducing sodium in packaged foods

The following is designed to entertain and inform, not provide medical advice. Always consult your doctor before starting a new treatment.

Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet Podcast, the show about reducing your kidney stone risk and living your best life. I'm your host and fellow student, Jeff Sarris.

And I'm Jill Harris, your kidney stone prevention nurse.

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All righty.

Hi, Jill. My name is Jean. I'm from Crown Point, Indiana, and I was diagnosed with kidney stones.

And I have a question for you. If something has a lot of sodium in it, say you buy chicken breasts that are already grilled and they're in strips, what if you were to rinse your food to remove some of the sodium? Does it actually reduce the sodium count in your food when you rinse your food that has high sodium?

Just curious. I'd appreciate feedback. Thanks.

Love you. Bye.

Jean, I love you, too, first of all, because we all need more love in the world. So when anybody, you know, I feel so lucky a lot of people say that to me, and I always say it right back, because the world could use some extra love. I love it myself.

So, Jean, thank you for that. I appreciate you. I also appreciate everybody that calls in.

You know, you don't have to do this.

It's part of your day. You're taking up time. So the fact that you dialed those numbers and asked us this question is pretty remarkable.

So, Jean, in Indiana, so, yeah, sure. If you boiled some food, the salt's going to come out in the water. If you rinsed a can of tuna, I do that when I'm having a can of tuna.

If you bought store-bought chicken, you know, it's going to be you could probably get the salt on the top of it out. If you boiled it for a while, yes, you are going to reduce the sodium in it.

You will. I don't know how much. You know, it would depend on how long you were rinsing it.

Would it be worth you doing at that point? Is it going to take away some of the flavor? Obviously, yes.

Is it going to ruin the feel of that already made chicken breast? May. Here's some things.

Instead of going through all that, you certainly can because it will reduce. You're just not going to know exactly how much it's going to reduce it by. Here's other things I would say.

Instead of putting yourself through that, something that's already cooked, I would say, and Jean's probably going to be like, "Well, I get it, girl, but I don't want to have to cook the chicken. That's why I'm getting it pre-made." Could you get, could you find, like a Trader Joe's? Trader Joe's is not by everybody, but I want you to know this: Trader Joe's does sell, with all their vegetables and stuff, so you'll see the vegetables, and then on the right-hand side, if you go all the way down, and it seems to be this way in any Trader Joe's, you're going to see pre-cooked chicken.

It typically is on the bottom shelf under like some pre-made sandwiches and stuff. Here's the veggies, and then you get to the end of it, and you're going to see all these pre-made things, and they have some grilled chicken with very low salt.

So, on those weeks when I'm really busy and I'm like, "You know what, I've got to get a couple pre-made chickens," they have grilled chicken breasts. One's rosemary balsamic and another one is a lemon, and they are freaking delicious. And the sodium, they don't salt these chickens, so you can get a big massive breast.

And they are very good. So look for prepared chickens that have lower salt, also.

And you won't like this, Jean, but more times than not, I'm making my own chicken. Meaning, I get the breast from the store. I put a little olive oil in a pan.

I put it on medium-high heat. I get that chicken cooked on one side for about a minute. I turn it over.

I put the heat down to simmer. I cover the pan for 15 minutes. I go do something else.

Tell Alexa to give me the 15-minute alarm, and my chicken's done for the week because I've just cooked four chicken breasts. That's it. It's so easy, less expensive, no salt.

And then I'll put some rosemary, or I just use fresh herbs. Instead of sodium, I use fresh herbs. And Jean, I'm not saying all the time, but honestly, you could do your own lemon pepper like the Trader Joe does.

It's 15 minutes. That's it. I take it out of the bag.

I take it out of the whoozey, put it in the pan. That's it. Medium-high, 1 minute, turn it over, put the whoozey back, the thing, the lid on the pan, down to simmer, 15 minutes.

So, why not?

And then you get like four nights, or four, you know, two lunches, two dinners, whatever you want to do, okay? Make chicken salad, whatever you want to do. I'm just saying, it's so easy.

So, you could have a combination of things. Could you reduce some of the sodium by boiling the hell out of that, by rinsing it off? Yes.

How much? We don't really know. The other thing, Jean, is you could say, "I'm having that chicken, so shut up!" Okay, have the chicken.

And if it's extra salty, can you watch your salt for the rest of the day? So maybe who cares about that much salt, right? Could you have less of a portion of that chicken and have more vegetables for that meal if you were wondering about the salt?

And then also, so you don't have to rinse it and wash it and all that other stuff. So there's, as I always say, many ways to skin a cat. And so, you know, you could just have a little less of that chicken and then that's going to be less salt and have more veggies.

So, you know, but yes, to answer your question, you could reduce the salt. I'm just saying you won't know how much, quite frankly. You really won't know how much of that salt is going to wash away.

Right? So, many different ways to do it, but yes, you can.

Yeah, and it is tough because when we're trying to track then, it's sort of a big, a big question mark. Is it is it very reduced? Is it barely reduced?

And sort of what are we talking about? So, it's a tough, it's a tough one to do.

It's Yes, it is. And but that is I will tell you what, though. So, for something that's pre-made, I'

Something that's pre-made, I don't want to mess it up. It's already pre-made. Does that make sense, Jeff?

Yeah, definitely does. Yeah, excuse me, because it is tough because

It's the expediency of having it made, having it seasoned and salted, and unfortunately, most pre-made food is very high in sodium. That's just it's salt tastes good. It's something that, like, immediately can make you feel positive about the product.

So, then it gets overused, unfortunately. Restaurants, too. Same thing, it just it's used with a heavy hand. [010:12] S2: People will say, "Jill, you need to open up a You need to open up a" What do they say?

A restaurant. "Why aren't there kidney stone diet safe restaurants?" Nobody's coming, [010:25] S2: people. Nobody's coming.

Let me tell you. So, yes, the kidney stone formers will come. There will There would be people, but, but the point is food manufacturers make what we buy.

And so, when you're first starting a low-salt diet, as my kidney stone formers know, they're like, "This is kind of bland," [010:46] S2: because you're so used to salt. You don't taste your food anymore, you just taste salt, right? So, food manufacturers make what we buy.

If we buy lower salt products, they'll make it. Look what keto did for sugar. There's Every product is low sugar now.

Low sugar, low sugar, no sugar added, because keto, that diet, made everybody ask for, [011:12] S2: "We don't want any sugar." And so, what'd food manufacturers do? "Okay, people want low sugar, we're going to make that." But focus groups say that when we give them the low sugar, it taste junky. "So, we're going to have to put more salt in there," right?

And sugar leaves a certain taste in our mouth. There's all kinds of things. It's about mouthfeel, taste, but also mouthfeel and what it does.

It conjures up these comforting thoughts, right? So, food is an amazing business. And so, these food manufacturers have to answer to Wall Street.

If we don't buy the products, they don't sell. Well, they're going to have to answer to Wall Street, right? So, people will also say, "Well, these food manufacturers are making us sick." Well, we're buying the products.

So, I mean, stop buying the products. Look for lower salt, lower sugar versions of things. [012:02] S2: You could see a lot more low salt these days, too. In ketchup, in rotisserie chickens.

I always buy a low-salt rotisserie chicken at my grocery store. Ask your grocers to start making those rotisserie chickens without salt. They will, if they're bought.

And, you know, people don't think that they can go in the meat section and say, "Listen, hey, Hank, can you make a couple low-salt rotisseries for me and my husband, because we're going to buy them?" "Okay, babe." [012:28] S2: Well, he doesn't say "babe." But you know what I'm saying, right? So, then they'll make them, and then if somebody sees the low-salt little label on the rotisserie chicken on the big thing, they're going to be like, "Oh, wow," and they're going to want one.

And then they're going to ask. So, ask for what you want, people, and food manufacturers, the more we ask, the more they'll make. But we have to buy it.

Look at gluten-free! Jeff's like, "Jesus Christ, Jill. We're not talking about gluten-free.

The lady, Jean, asked about sodium and rinsing." But look at what gluten-free Most people buying gluten-free are not gluten sensitive. They just think that's the healthy thing to do. [012:59] S2: Gluten-free on everything, from muffins to bread to cake to everything. They bought it.

They make it. They buy it. And so it goes.

So start asking for lower salt items in your grocery store for ready-made things, and you'd be surprised what people do. But, you know, it's What are we talking about? [013:28] S1: No, but that's perfect. I mean, that is the thing.

It's, yeah, if you're If we're supporting the things that we want to see, there will be more of them, and it all takes time. Like every We It's a big The food sort of system is a big ship that, like, gluten-free wasn't overnight. That was over years.

And then the lower sugar, like, we cranked up sugar for so many years. It took a long time for the sugar to come back down. So, yeah, it's all It's a whole balancing act.

But [013:56] S2: Look, and it's always something. In the '80s, it was fat. And so what'd they do?

They took fat out and put sugar in because, again, that mouthfeel we get when we're eating something with fat in it, it's we like that. And so sugar can create that same mouthfeel. So marketers start The food manufacturers started putting more sugar in it because, again, focus groups were like, "This is disgusting without the fat.

I don't want this cookie." So, they put more sugar in. The low-fat fad made us a hell of a lot fatter. I remember I remember there was a Seinfeld episode where Elaine was eating the sugar-free FroYo.

Oh, god bless. It's so funny. And she kept going in and kept going, "This is the best thing ever, and it's no sugar!" [014:40] S1: Or low-fat!

It was low-fat at that time, yeah! [014:42] S2: Low-fat! Low-fat! And then her friends, George and the guys were like, " " and Elaine was like, " I'm not fitting in my pants anymore." And then, you know.

But I'm just saying, so we also want to believe that there is this miracle fill-in-the-blank. That we're going to be able to eat as much as we want of, and we're going to remain thin. It's not It's not how it is.

It's not how it is. It's not how it is. So, eat all food.

Have your FroYo. Have your SnackWells, whatever the hell you're doing, have it! And then get right back on track.

That's how we do it at Kidney Stone Diet. This kind of advice has been, you know, people don't want to hear it because they want to give up one thing so they can eat as much as they want of something else. That's what the diet industry banks on.

Take something away from patients or people, and then, but tell them they can have as much as they want. "This has no points, so have it!" Or, "This is fine as long as you don't have bread." I mean, you know, that's what we want to do, but it doesn't work long-term. For some people, it does, and God bless, but they're not the norm.

Most people are not able to do those kind of take away this and you can have as much as you want of that, long-term. It just doesn't work. We should be eating a wide variety of foods in normal portion sizes, enjoy our things here and there, and get right back on track.

That's how we do it. [016:11] S2: Yep. [016:12] S1: So, on that note, I think we should wrap for this week. In terms of staying on track, every weekend, Jill sends an email out to keep you inspired to stay on track, and you can find that It's a free email, but you can subscribe at kidneystonediet.com. And while there, you can find everything: the course, the meal plans, the all the free content, all the 130-something episodes that we have of this show.

They're all there, and you can find everything that you need at kidneystonediet.com. And if you have a question, if you want to be featured on the show, it's 773-789-8763, and we'll feature your voice on a future episode. Yeah, I think that's a good spot to wrap, and with that, we will see you next week! [016:56] S2: Thanks, Jean, so much!