Shrink in the Kitchen

A wonderful, intriguing piece in The NY Times today on salt.

The city wants to require chains to lower amounts of salt used in franchise or chain restaurants.

But a reporter went around town, collected favorite dishes from independent restaurants, and sent them to a lab.

The big loser was Katz’s, where, the corned beef sandwich had 4,490 milligrams of sodium.  According to the reporter, that is equal to the amount of sodium in 10 hamburgers from Micky D’s.

According to the article, The Food and Drug Administration, “Recommends a maximum of 2,400 milligrams of sodium per day and 1,500 per day for people who have hypertension and African-Americans (who are at higher risk of hypertension) or are beyond an unspecified middle age.”

Imagine what would happen if The SP (Salt Police) went around to all of our favorite places and checked the salt in the omelets, sandwiches, soups, noodle dishes, and fancy food we eat in restaurants.

One chief reason to learn to cook at home is to control what you put in the food.

Eating out should be a luxury.

www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/nyregion/31critic.html?em