Have a BLT!

It’s summer and there are so many great tomatoes available, especially if you grow your own. One of the best ways to enjoy a summer tomato is part of a delicious BLT sandwich. If you haven’t had a BLT lately, you should. Every bite is a melange of flavors and textures like nothing else. Just use these ingredients, and you’ll have a highly nutritious yet sensuous feast. The only thing to watch is the sodium, because of the commercial bread and the bacon. One sandwich contains over half the total recommended sodium for someone on a low-sodium diet, and about one third for a regular diet.  Just make sure you’re lower sodium the rest of the day. This recipe makes 3 sandwiches (two for my husband and one for me).

1 package Oscar Mayer pre-cooked bacon
6 slices Orowheat double fiber bread (wheatberry is also a good choice)
2 beefsteak tomatoes, washed and sliced thinly (or substitute with whatever you have)
iceberg or Romaine lettuce leaves, washed and dried
3 tablespoons Best Foods (Hellmans) Canola Mayonnaise

Even though it’s fully cooked, I heat the bacon in the microwave for about 30 seconds, which crisps it a little. Toast the bread thoroughly so it’s hearty. Spread the mayonnaise on both sides. Layer the lettuce, then the tomatoes, then the bacon on top. Approximate nutritional breakdown per sandwich: 305 calories, 15g fat, 845mg sodium, 22g net carb, 14g fiber, 16g protein

How much sodium is good?

I had a grilled stuff steak burrito (minus rice) at Taco Bell the other day. It was delicious and not too terrible an indulgence, with about 600 calories and 25 grams of fat. Even though it has 73 carbs, it also has 30 grams of protein. But then there’s the sodium: 1930mg. For one burrito! That’s almost an entire day of recommended sodium.

The American Diabetes Association recommends keeping daily sodium intake at 2400mg or lower: http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-cholesterol/faqs-sodium.jsp. OK, give it a try.

Fast food is notorious, but more for calories, carbs, and fat than sodium. Diabetics have to be careful about blood sugar levels and especially spikes, but we also have to carefully watch our sodium intake. High blood pressure precedes heart disease, stroke, and kidney failure. So we have to be wary not only of sweets, but of any packaged breads, canned foods, frozen convenience foods, restaurant food, or anything else that’s both convenient and tasty–including fast food. It’s all high in sodium.

I recently purchased a package of Mission multi-grain taco tortillas that contained 460mg of sodium…each. After I read all the nutrition information, I threw the package away. I will include more information about Mission tortillas (which I generally like) in a future entry.

For frozen meals, I’ve noticed that only the Healthy Choice and Lean Cuisine LInes seem to care about keeping sodium levels decent–about 600mg or less per serving. Lean Cuisine will go higher if you choose the larger entrees. I will provide a comparison table of frozen meals in a future entry. One meal I wholeheartedly endorse, and which might surprise you, is the family size serving of Stouffer’s Lasagne. The one in the red package. It serves 5 (about 1 cup each), and is fairly low in calories (270) and carbs. And even the sodium content (770mg) isn’t that bad. So when you need a quick and easy meal, serve it up with a salad and diet dressing, and you can feel pretty good about it.

The bottom line: If you want to keep sodium levels consistently reasonable, you’re going to have to cook. Here are a few items that help us keep cooking at home simple while keeping the sodium low.

-Sodium-free bouillon, both chicken and beef flavor (I like the packets versus the jars, but both are good)
-Small jars of dried or ground herbs (so they stay fresher): rosemary, bay leaves, bouquet garni, cumin
-McCormick Salt Free and Less Sodium Seasonings: we love Montreal Steak 25% less sodium for steaks and use Spicy or Lemon & Pepper on roasts or sauteed meats
-If you’re not drinkers and you can have alcohol, keep a few small bottles of wine (Cost Plus World Market sells the small bottles individually) around for adding to roasts, stews, soups
-Salt free or reduced sodium canned products: I’ve found tomatoes, green beans, and mushrooms

Partial takeout is another option. Grocery stores are full of convenience items these days, and most of them are really, really high in sodium. But some aren’t. I love Safeway’s deli meatloaf. Each 3 oz serving (which is a little small for us) contains 200 calories, 11g fat, 6g net carb, and 460mg sodium. That’s high sodium, but not so high for a convenience food. Serve with small white potatoes baked in the microwave and a few vegetables (we keep lots of bags of sodium-free vegetables in the freezer).

Splenda

From splenda.com:

“SPLENDA® No Calorie Sweetener can lower carbohydrates and calories in recipes. For example, a cup of SPLENDA® Granular has 96 calories and 24 grams of carbohydrates, compared to the 770 calories and 192 grams of carbs found in a cup of sugar. Since SPLENDA® Granular measures and pours like sugar, you can use it like sugar in your favorite recipes. For your favorite beverages, SPLENDA® Packets are the perfect size to take with you anywhere you go.”

I tried baking with it. It just doesn’t seem to mitigate the carb count in baked goods enough to make it worth the effort, because baked goods usually contain wheat flour, which is also high in carb. Plus, baking with Splenda leads to uneven results. Sometimes the baked good ends up too sweet, and sometimes not sweet enough. By the way, you might want to try your favorite banana bread recipe without any sugar or Splenda. A friend told me that the bananas sweeten the bread naturally. I tried it with only 1/4 cup added Splenda, and it was plenty sweet. So if you previously added a cup of sugar, you would be saving quite a few carbs and calories by substituting Splenda and using much less of it.

Baked goods aside, I think Splenda is a fantastic product for a number of uses:
-Fresh squeezed lemonade
-Dressings and marinades
-Fruit crisps and cobblers (with low-glycemic fruit and oat flour)
-Drizzles to sweeten things with lowered sugar

Any sweetened liquid is like kryptonite to a diabetic, because the liquid is processed into the bloodstream so quickly, thereby spiking blood sugar. So lemonade, orange juice, apple juice, and regular soda are out. But with Splenda, we can have our juice and drink it, too. For this reason alone, Splenda is a miracle product.

When every single carb counts, I think it’s worth it to use Splenda. I love sweets, and I can have dessert as long as my dinner has been low carb and high protein. I’m lucky. My mother-in-law has been diabetic for 20 years but recently was able to go off insulin by changing her meds and going strictly low carb. So when we have her over for dinner, I can still serve dessert if I use Splenda and some care. I’ll be posting my rhubarb crisp recipe here soon.

I also think it’s worth it to use Splenda for marinades and dressings to keep carb count really low. For example, the Kung Pao chicken recipe featured in this blog is delicious and very low in carbs; substituting Splenda for sugar makes no difference in taste and saves 4g carb and 45 calories. I also mix our own tomato-based barbecue marinade and use Splenda for a little sweetening. Splenda doesn’t work as a part of a basting sauce, though. Real sugar crystalizes, and Splenda won’t.