Heart-Healthy Cooking for Beginners: 3 Label Numbers

Heart-healthy cooking for a beginner starts with three figures on the food label and a few kitchen habits. When you shop, compare saturated fat, sodium and added sugars, the three nutrients that the FDA guide to the Nutrition Facts label lists as ones to get less of. When you cook, bake, roast, broil or stir fry instead of frying, cook with olive or canola oil instead of butter, and season with herbs, citrus juice and vinegar instead of salt. The FDA's separate Daily Value reference guide, cited with the table below, sets the yardsticks at 20 g of saturated fat, 2,300 mg of sodium and 50 g of added sugars a day.

Which three label figures should you compare when you shop?

The label guide says eating too much saturated fat and sodium is associated with an increased risk of conditions such as cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure. Its general guide to percent Daily Value (%DV) is short: 5% DV or less of a nutrient per serving is considered low, and 20% DV or more per serving is considered high.

The table converts those two lines into grams and milligrams for each of the three nutrients. Each figure is the Daily Value multiplied by 0.05 or by 0.20.

Every amount on a label refers to one serving, so read the serving size before the percentages. The FDA's sample label shows a product with 37% DV for sodium per serving, which is high; two servings supply 74% of the day's sodium. The serving size reflects what people typically eat or drink, and it is not a recommendation of how much to eat. When you compare two products, make sure the serving sizes match.

Two sources give different gram figures for saturated fat. MedlinePlus: Facts about saturated fats cites the Dietary Guidelines limit of less than 10% of daily calories and works that out as 200 calories or 22 g on a 2,000-calorie diet, while the label's Daily Value is 20 g. The same page puts 1 tablespoon of butter at 7 g of saturated fat. Against the 20 g Daily Value that is 35% (7 ÷ 20), above the 20% high line.

On the label, the word "includes" before added sugars indicates that they are counted within the grams of total sugars. The FDA page on added sugars gives a container of yogurt with added sweeteners as its example: 7 g of added sugars and 8 g of naturally occurring sugars, for a total of 15 g. Those 7 g represent 14% of the Daily Value. The page ties the 50 g figure to the Dietary Guidelines limit of less than 10 percent of calories, which on a 2,000-calorie diet is 200 calories or 50 g.

How do you read a recipe's nutrition line?

Each archived recipe on this site prints a yield, a serving size and a line of nutrition figures. This guide reads that line the way a label is read, as the amount in one printed serving; that reading is the guide's assumption. The formula for each nutrient is the printed amount divided by the Daily Value, times 100. Two archived recipes serve as the example.

Neither recipe reaches the 20% high line for either nutrient. The archived Baked Salmon Dijon page prints 196 calories, 2 g of saturated fat and 229 mg of sodium, which is 10% DV for saturated fat (2 ÷ 20) and 10% DV for sodium (229 ÷ 2,300). The creole's printed 1 g of saturated fat works out to 5% DV (1 ÷ 20), the low line.

Sodium is the larger of the creole's two percentages. The archived 20-Minute Chicken Creole page prints 383 mg of sodium with a serving size of 1½ cups, or 17% DV (383 ÷ 2,300). As an example of the arithmetic, two such servings would be 766 mg (383 × 2), or 33% DV (766 ÷ 2,300). The ingredients the page prints include 1 cup of chili sauce, with the note to look for the lowest sodium version, and ¼ teaspoon of salt.

The two archived nutrition lines print calories, total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, sodium, total fiber, protein, carbohydrates and potassium. Added sugars are not among those entries. The FDA page on added sugars counts sugars added during processing, table sugar, sugars from syrups and honey, and sugars from concentrated fruit or vegetable juices.

Which cooking methods and swaps cut saturated fat?

MedlinePlus: Simple, heart-smart substitutions says to bake, roast, broil or stir fry meat instead of frying it, to remove the skin from chicken and turkey before cooking, to cut off visible fat, and to pour off any fat that pools in the pan. For cuts, it names pork tenderloin or loin chops and beef labeled "choice" or "select", and it says to avoid marbled beef or cuts marked "prime".

The same page says to cook with olive, canola, corn or safflower oil instead of butter. It replaces heavy cream with evaporated skim milk, and whole milk with skim or low-fat milk, which it says usually works for most or all of the volume with no loss of quality.

NHLBI: Choose Heart-Healthy Foods lists 95% lean ground beef, pork tenderloin, and skinless chicken or turkey among lean meats, and it names canola, corn, olive, safflower, sesame, sunflower and soybean oils while excluding coconut and palm oil. For fish, MedlinePlus points to herring, sardines, salmon, tuna, trout and mackerel as high in omega-3 fatty acids.

This site's archived Basic Cooking Instructions page has a method table for chicken and another for seafood. Its grilling entry for chicken says to spray nonstick cooking spray on the grill pan or grill racks and to cook chicken to a minimum internal temperature of 165 °F. The archived Food Preparation Glossary defines "Sauté, Pan Fry, or Stir Fry" as cooking food quickly, for just a few minutes, in a small amount of fat over direct heat.

How do you season food with less salt?

Most dietary sodium does not come from the salt shaker. The FDA page on sodium in your diet says over 70% of it comes from eating packaged and prepared foods, not from table salt added when cooking or eating. The same page says Americans eat about 3,400 mg a day on average against a recommended limit of less than 2,300 mg, which it equates to about 1 teaspoon of table salt. MedlinePlus: Cooking without salt says ready-to-eat foods account for 75% of the sodium in the American diet.

The MedlinePlus page calls 140 mg or less per serving a healthy level of sodium, which is 6% of the Daily Value (140 ÷ 2,300, rounded). The FDA page's tips for reducing sodium include these four:

• Buy vegetables fresh, frozen without sauce or seasoning, or canned as low sodium or no-salt-added.
• Rinse canned beans, tuna and vegetables before eating, which removes some of the sodium.
• Check the package on fresh meat and poultry for added salt water or saline.
• Use a small amount of a flavoring packet instead of the whole packet.

In place of salt, MedlinePlus lists orange, lemon or lime juice, spices and herbs, vinegar, and salt-free herb blends. It also says to avoid onion salt and garlic salt and use fresh garlic and onion or their powders, to read the labels on spice mixes because some have added salt, and to add vinegar at the end of cooking time for the most flavor.

MedlinePlus pairs herbs and spices with specific foods. For green beans it lists dill, lemon juice, marjoram, oregano, tarragon and thyme; for chicken, poultry seasoning, rosemary, sage, tarragon and thyme; for fish, curry powder, dill, dry mustard, lemon juice, paprika and pepper. This site's archived Vegetables category page displays recipes 1 to 10 of 20, among them Asparagus With Lemon Sauce and Cinnamon-Glazed Baby Carrots.

MedlinePlus says you will notice a difference when you first start cooking without salt, and that after a period of adjustment most people stop missing it. The heart-healthy foods page cited above says people who have high blood pressure may need to limit sodium even more, and it directs readers to talk to a healthcare provider about the amount of sodium that is right for them.

Where does added sugar come from in home cooking?

Sweetened drinks account for about half of all added sugars consumed, according to the heart-healthy foods page cited above. The same page lists the names added sugars go by: brown sugar, corn syrup, dextrose, fructose, glucose, high-fructose corn syrup, raw sugar and sucrose.

MedlinePlus says to cut sugar in recipes by one third or more, and that you often will not notice a difference. It also suggests unsweetened applesauce in equal amounts in place of sugar, and ginger, allspice or cinnamon in oatmeal. As a hypothetical example of a one-third cut, a recipe written for 3 tablespoons of sugar and made with 2 uses one third less: (3 − 2) ÷ 3.

Which grains and proteins round out the plate?

MedlinePlus says to prepare meat as just a part of the meal instead of the main attraction. Its example is pork stir-fried with broccoli and served over brown rice, which it says adds a serving of vegetables and a whole grain. It also suggests trying meat substitutes, and says beans are great in soups, salads and over rice.

For grains, MedlinePlus says to look for whole grain breads, cereals and crackers that list whole wheat as the first ingredient on their labels, and for brown or wild rice instead of white rice. It notes that products described as "multi-grain" may or may not contain whole grains. This guide is filed under the site's healthy eating topic hub.