Obesity

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Tips to Reduce Salt Intake

207.   Here are some guidelines to help reduce the amount of sodium in your diet: –

• Learn to enjoy the smell and flavours of unsalted natural foods.
• Eat plenty of fresh fruits and raw / steamed vegetables. They are a good source of potassium, which keeps sodium away and lowers blood pressure.
• Try flavouring foods, meat, poultry and fish with herbs, onions, garlic, ginger, spices and lemon juice in cooking or at the table.
• Cook food without salt or with only a minimal amount of coarse grain (rock salt) which adds a burst of flavour with about 25% less sodium.
• Take the salt-shaker off the dining table.
• Rinse salt from canned vegetables / foods, fish, meat and poultry.
• Read food labels carefully and buy no-salt added or low / reduced sodium versions of food and breakfast cereals.
• Avoid salt laden fast and Chinese foods which are also rich in calories.
• Drink plenty of water to flush out sodium and other waste products.

 Starch (Maida)

208.   With more and more people adopting western and urban lifestyles, refined grains have largely displaced the healthier wholegrains. When a wholegrain is refined, its nutrition profile changes for the worse. During the refining process, the outer coating i.e. bran is removed. Since the nutrient rich germ is attached to the bran, even the germ is ripped off, leaving mainly endosperm or the starch minus the fibre, protein, fat, vitamins and minerals. Examples of such refined grains include starch (maida), polished rice and even sooji. These foods are devoid of the goodness of wholegrains and provide mainly carbohydrates for quick energy.

 Starch and Blood Sugar

209.   Starch contains thousands of sugar molecules bound together which must first be split into single molecule sugars by the body before they can be absorbed. These reactions occur so rapidly in the intestines that most starches cause soaring rises in blood sugar levels and then bring them back crashing down. Eating starch has almost the same effect on blood sugar levels as eating table sugar. Ideally, you do not want your blood sugar level to rise too high because it causes sugar to attach to the outer surface membranes of cells. Sugar, by itself, is harmless, but after being attached to membranes sugar is converted to sorbitol, which damages cells. That is why diabetics who carry high blood sugar levels can suffer extensive nerve damage with many associated complications.

 Junk Starchy Foods

210.   Foods that have been stripped off its fibre, vitamins and minerals content are categorised as junk foods. Therefore, all foods made from white starch (maida) like white bread, pizzas, burgers, pastries, cakes, chocolates, samosas, white noodles etc. fall under this category. Moreover, to add to their unhealthy woes, the foods containing refined carbohydrates (maida) are generally prepared either with a lot of refined oils, saturated fats or more dangerously with hydrogenated oils. They terrorise and traumatise your metabolism and set the foundation for the development of a whole range of degenerative diseases like obesity, blood pressure, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and food allergies.