Although the information on this website is aimed at helping adult women to achieve and maintain a healthy weight, the salt allowances for children have been given so that any parents reading this are aware that their children should not be eating as much salt as they themselves are.

 

An excessive salt intake is bad for health, so even if you don’t need to lose much, if any, weight, you could still be risking your health by eating too much salt. Salt may be listed as ‘sodium’ on food labels. Some foods don’t have any salt added to them but they naturally contain a very small amount of salt. For example, Organic Bite-Sized Shredded Wheat doesn’t have any salt added, but an insignificant amount of salt is naturally present in the wheat, which is why sodium is listed in the nutritional breakdown, and is given as 0.2 grams of salt per 45 gram serving of the cereal.

 

Although baked beans are regarded as a healthy convenience food, most of them contain 2 grams of salt in half a large can, which is a typical portion. Some food manufacturers, including manufacturers of baked beans, are now just listing sodium in the nutritional breakdown of their products. The actual amount of salt in a product is roughly equal to 2½ times the amount of sodium. So if a can of beans just states that it has 0.7 grams of sodium, it will actually contain about 1.75 grams of salt – nearly a third of the maximum daily amount for adults, and nearly the entire maximum daily amount for a child under 3 years.

 

Unfortunately, ready-made soup, whether it’s chilled in a carton, or canned, also contains a lot of salt. So if you like soup or baked beans, it’s important not to eat other high-salt foods or drinks.

 

Be aware that many product labels state the amount of sodium or salt contained in half  of the container, and you may well be intending to eat the whole container!

 

As stated before, it is quite difficult to find ready-prepared foods that are low in salt, so it is important to consider what foods to ‘spend’ your salt allowance on – don’t ‘spend’ it on crisps and similar snacks, but do ‘spend’ it on a nutritious main meal.

·         Introduction - follow a balanced diet for weight-loss

·        Guidelines - balanced diet

·         Guidelines - fat

·        Guidelines - sugar

·         Guidelines - salt   <<<<<

·        Guidelines - alcohol

·         Food labels

·        Breakfasts and mid-morning snack suggestions

·         Lunch and mid-afternoon snack suggestions

·        Evening meal and supper suggestions

·         Eating out, special occasions, and holidays

·        Morale, motivation, and stress

·         Exercise – but first of all, relax!

·        Carbs, Glycaemic Index and Load

·         alli pills

·        Meal replacement weight-loss products  

·         Wholemeal muffins - about

·        Spiced choc-chip wholemeal muffins

·         Double choc-chip wholemeal muffins

·        Chocolate and prune wholemeal muffins