Less Sugar, Salt, and Saturated Fat: Scientists Discovered a Way to Reduce Them
It is thanks to a group of researchers from Penn State who have identified a way that may lower the levels of saturated fat, sugar, and salt in common foods served in the US without affecting the dishes’ overall flavor. It may seem too good to be true, but in reality, it wasn’t that difficult to accomplish. As a direct response to the craze for low-fat diets that swept the nation in the 1990s, a great number of food producers removed all saturated fats from their products and replaced them with sugars in order to preserve their original tastes. The problem with taking this strategy is that, in today’s society, the typical person consumes an unhealthy quantity of saturated fat.
Continue reading down below.
By substituting herbs and spices for salt, sugar, and saturated in commonly consumed dishes in the United States, researchers have discovered a technique to lower the overall amount of these ingredients without negatively impacting the flavor.
[…] we know that one of the key barriers to reducing intake of these ingredients is the flavor of the food. If you want people to eat healthy food, it has to taste good. That’s why our finding that participants actually preferred some of the recipes in which much of the saturated fat and salt was replaced with herbs and spices is so important, stated Kristina Petersen, associate professor of nutritional sciences at Penn State.
That’s very remarkable, don’t you think? The use of herbs and spices is a prevalent cultural practice in certain cultures; hence, some of you may not find this information to be all that surprising.
Researchers collaborated with culinary professionals to improve their findings and made use of nationally representative data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to determine the top 10 most consumed foods that contain added sugars, saturated fat, and are typically high in sodium. Can you guess what some of the foods are?
That featured brownies, meatloaf, macaroni and cheese, and chicken pot pies (surprise!).
Take a look at how some clever academics enhanced one of the world’s most beloved dishes:
The researchers changed the nutritional profile of the macaroni and cheese dish by using unsalted butter instead of salted butter and cutting the total amount of butter called for in the original recipe by 75%. The 2% milk that was used was switched out for skim milk, and some of the American cheese was substituted with cheese with a lower fat content. The additional salt was removed from the diet as well. Paprika, powdered mustard seed, onion powder, cayenne pepper, and garlic powder were some of the herbs and spices that were added by the researchers. That seems like it would be really tasty!
Would you be willing to try some of that macaroni and cheese? Leave a comment below and tell us what you think!
Tiesha loves to share her passion for everything that’s beautiful in this world. Apart from writing on her beauty blog and running her own beauty channel on Youtube, she also enjoys traveling and photography. Tiesha covers various stories on the website.
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