Katie Ferraro (1s):

So let's say you're doing roasted carrots or parsnips for baby led weaning. This is a great opportunity to introduce your baby to some new flavors that don't rely on salt. Right? You can sprinkle them with cinnamon or cumin or nutmeg. These are new flavors, no salt. Hey there, I'm Katie Ferraro, Registered Dietitian, college nutrition professor, and mama of seven specializing in baby led weaning. Here on the Baby-Led Weaning Made Easy podcast I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, leaving you with the competence and knowledge you need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby led weaning.

Katie Ferraro (44s):

Welcome back to another episode of the baby led weaning made easy podcast today. We're talking all about salt. I get questions all the time from parents. Like what's the deal with sodium? How come my baby shouldn't have very much of it, but how much can they really have? That's why I put together these three easy ways for you to minimize sodium for your baby. So I like to start out each episode of the podcast with a baby led weaning tip of the day. Here's yours for today. Rinsing your canned goods under the faucet can reduce the sodium by about a third. Now you might be like, wait a minute. I'm feeding my baby food from a can. I'm going to share some super easy rule of thumb tricks for determining how much sodium you want to stay under when you're reading labels.

Katie Ferraro (1m 33s):

So hang tight, we're going to talk all about picking packaged foods, how much sodium you want to look for, but if you can't find the lowest sodium one out there do remember that rinsing them underneath the faucet, reduces the salt by about a third. Now, why do we want to keep salt to a minimum for babies? We know that early exposure to high sodium foods can start a lifelong preference for those salty foods. When your baby's in this very crucial period, the weaning period, we want the babies to learn how to taste the flavors of the food, not mask them with a ton of sodium. Another problem with too much salt is that highest salt take intake, high salt intake, rather, and reliance on salty foods that can set the stage for problems later in life.

Katie Ferraro (2m 18s):

As high sodium intake is associated with links to things like high blood pressure and heart disease. That's a good idea to set the foundation for wholesome and healthful foods, many of which are not high in sodium. And if you think about it, your baby's kidneys, they're actually not even developed enough to handle the really high mineral load of like a super salty diet. So when in doubt we say, leave it out. Now how much salt should babies be eating? That's a question. I get a lot in the US and Canada. We have no official upper limit for sodium under age one. So it's a little hard to say here's the maximum that the baby should eat because we like to give evidence-based guidelines. Just know that there aren't any in north America.

Katie Ferraro (3m 0s):

Now we can look at in the U S from one to three, the guidelines eight one to three year old should get less than 1500 milligrams. But for babies, we actually want to go lower than that. And we're going to use some other countries guidelines to set that framework. So if you look at Australia, Australia, they have a little bit of a tighter limit. They say a thousand milligrams per day for one to three-year-olds, but I really like the UK guidelines. Hey, the UK guideline is less than 400 milligrams of sodium per day for babies who are six to 12 months old. Okay. In the UK is even tighter saying less than 800 milligrams of sodium for one to three-year-olds.

Katie Ferraro (3m 42s):

So let's work with the UK guidelines, 400 milligrams a day for six to 12 month olds. Okay. Now sometimes we use the word salt and sodium interchangeably, but table salt is like, you may have it in a salt shaker on your table or in your kitchen. That's sodium chloride. Okay. We call that salt, but it's really only 40% sodium. So table salt is 40% sodium and 60% chloride not to get too deep in the weeds with the numbers, but let's say a teaspoon of salt. Okay. That's approximately six grams again, because it's salt. It's 40% sodium. So that's about 2300 milligrams of sodium.

Katie Ferraro (4m 22s):

So a teaspoon of salt has 2300 milligrams. We're trying to keep your baby under 400 milligrams a day. So if you cut that in for a quarter of a teaspoon has about 600 milligrams, an eighth of a teaspoon has about 300 milligrams. So if you're, if you're a cook or a baker, you're familiar with teaspoons, but most people are like, well, that doesn't mean anything to me. So let's back it up and look at the sources of sodium in the diet, which to be honest, doesn't come primarily from the salt shaker, right? We can talk about teaspoons and an eighth of a teaspoon, but that's not where salt sneaks into the baby's diet. Okay. So salt from the salt shaker is not the primary source of sodium in the typical Western diet.

Katie Ferraro (5m 3s):

Okay. Things like fast food is convenience. Foods are high in salt. Certain frozen foods are high in salts, soups of processed foods, salty snack foods. These are all the foods that actually contribute the greatest amount of sodium to the diet. So the salt shaker, yeah. We don't want to add salt in the foods that we're making our babies, but we do want to be aware of where salt does sneak into the diet. And it's lots of other sources. So let's talk about those three easy ways to minimize sodium. My first tip for you is to read your labels. I know that's, you know, people like that's a lot of work, but there's a tip here. Okay? Think about people say, well, labels, I thought you're supposed to be feeding your baby whole foods.

Katie Ferraro (5m 45s):

If you're doing baby led weaning. And the reality is if you're doing baby led weaning, the majority of the foods that you're offering, your baby are single isolated foods that are prepared in their whole natural state. They're not processed. So they're low sodium or no sodium naturally. Okay. That's a given. But the reality in real life, we eat foods that come from packages sometimes. Okay. So if you do buy foods with labels, no added salt is best. Okay. No added salt means just what it says. Sometimes foods have naturally occurring sources of sodium, like certain types of seafood and shellfish are naturally going to be high in lots of minerals, including sodium. But I'm talking about when you buy packaged foods more often than not, we don't serve packaged foods, but if you do look for no added salt, low sodium is next low sodium means less than 140 milligrams per serving.

Katie Ferraro (6m 35s):

Okay. We said, we're using those UK guidelines. We're trying to keep the sodium to around 400 milligrams of sodium or less a day. Some parents get really into it. And they're like, okay, I'm calculating how much breast milk I'm giving. Then I'm taking the sodium from there to be on some of this. You know, you're just, you're kind of winging it day by day. You don't need to calculate your baby's exact sodium milligrams. Okay. But I don't generally account for the sodium that the baby's getting in breast milk, or there's a little bit in formula. I'm talking about the sodium from the added foods. So for aiming for 400 or less using the UK guidelines, a low sodium food with it says low sodium on the package. That means it's 140 milligrams or less per serving avoid. I recommend avoiding reduced sodium reduced sodium foods just mean there's 25% less sodium than the usual version of that food.

Katie Ferraro (7m 23s):

So take like wheat thins is a good one. Okay. A salty cracker. If you bought reduced sodium wheat, then sometimes parents are like, oh, that's the good one for babies because there's no salt in it now just because it's reduced. Sodium only means there's 25% less sodium than in regular wheat thins. Okay. Now there are no added salt versions of crackers and low salt crackers that I would recommend instead of reduced sodium. Another example of that is soy sauce. You sometimes people hear people say, oh, I'm, I'm give me that low sodium soy sauce. The one that comes in the green bottle guys is not low sodium soy sauce. It's just reduced sodium, which all that means is if soy sauce is liquid salt reduced sodium just has 25% less sodium than the liquid salt. Okay. So we're going to look for no added salt is the best low sodium is second best steer clear of reduced sodium because it's generally not going to be low enough.

Katie Ferraro (8m 11s):

So when I'm looking at canned goods, I stick to a rule of a hundred milligrams of sodium or less. If I'm in a feed of food to my baby, I look, I turn the package over, look right at the sodium. If there's a hundred milligrams of sodium or less, I think, Hmm. Since I don't feed my baby a lot of packaged foods, this is a sometimes food. The ones that have less than a hundred milligrams of sodium is one that I'm going to choose. Now, again, this is a rule of thumb. Okay. It's I think it's realistic. If you're not feeding packaged foods often when you do aim for a hundred milligrams or less, and you want to take into consideration that that a hundred milligrams of sodium per serving that's serving sizes based on an adult serving size. And of course, babies, especially early on, do not eat anywhere close to what the posted serving sizes.

Katie Ferraro (8m 56s):

So you might be doing the math in your head, but remember your baby's only gonna have a few bites of that. Just choose the lower sodium ones. If we're talking about packaged foods, less than a hundred milligrams is pretty good. And don't forget if you're doing those canned goods and you can't get the lowest one, rinsing them underneath the faucet, reduces the sodium by about a third. Okay. So my first tip for you for minimizing sodium, read your labels, try to stick to that hundred milligram rule of thumb. Second tip for minimizing sodium for your baby, the salt for the adults who are eating after you portion out what you're feeding your baby. Right? One of the benefits of baby led weaning is that we can provide slightly modified versions of the same foods that we're eating and give those to our baby.

Katie Ferraro (9m 36s):

Okay. But parents will ask like, okay, well, when can I start giving my baby salt? You don't need to add extra salt to anything that your baby eats. Okay? You can make the recipe of whatever it is that you were making. And then if your prone to eating more salt, just add it to your portion. Afterwards. Third tip for minimizing sodium for your babies is to flavor foods with seasonings other than salt, right? There's a whole world of different flavors out there. It's desirable to feed your baby. The widest variety possible of foods and flavors and tastes and textures. We sometimes forget about the flavoring, right? Flavoring comes in lots of, of salt-free selection. So let's say you're making roasted carrots or roasted parsnips for baby led weaning.

Katie Ferraro (10m 17s):

You would cut off the tops of the carrots or the parsnips PLM, cut them into fat French fry shapes. I like to cover with a lot of oil. Oil helps makes things more moist. And the more moisture your baby is eating in the foods they're eating, the less likely they are to choke. But before I pop that tray of parsnips or carrots covered in oil in the oven, why don't you give it a toss with a new flavor for your baby? Okay. I mean, parsnips by themselves or carrots by themselves are fine, but you could add seasoning things. I do this before I put it in the oven, either cinnamon. I think cinnamon is a really cool flavor. Especially with carrots. You can do cumin. Okay. You can do nutmeg. You could sprinkle cardamom on there, like literally go through your spice cabinet and you could probably put most of those.

Katie Ferraro (10m 59s):

I wouldn't put them all together. Okay. At once I would do these individually, but it's just a way to add new flavor to a food. You know that your baby is exploring or trying. There's lots of salt-free options. So please don't be afraid to explore with flavor. Sometimes parents think, oh gosh, my baby has to eat bland food. When they're learning how to eat. No, they don't have to eat bland food. Okay. You can start with bland foods if you want to, but we want to increase exposure to different flavors. So you can do this without salt. If you're looking for more information on seasoning your babies foods without salt, I have a flavoring guide inside of my quick start guide to baby led weaning. This is a 16 page e-book it's jam packed with everything you need to know to get it safe, start to solid foods.

Katie Ferraro (11m 43s):

But I have a whole page that shows you how to flavor foods, that babies will love that don't require salt. So I give you the food and then a whole bunch of salt-free seasoning ideas that quick start guide. Also a recipe for my savory homemade salt-free herbs seasoning. You make a big batch of this one-time it makes like 30 portions or more super simple seasoning mix. Doesn't have salt. You can add it to meats and vegetables. It's a great way to kick up the flavor of lots of foods that you're making for your baby without having to use salt. So you can find a link to that. Quick-start guide at the show notes page for this episode, which is blwpodcast.com/33. So hope you guys now know a little bit about sodium three easy ways to minimize sodium, try to keep it under 400 milligrams a day total, if you can, from processed or added foods that aren't the wholesome foods you're making at home.

Katie Ferraro (12m 35s):

If you have to use packaged foods on occasion, go for it. I say, try to stay below a hundred milligrams of sodium per adult serving size, if you can, and you're doing a good job, keep up the good work and I'll see you next time. Bye now!