Toddlers and Salt

I am always concerned with the sodium intake of my family, but as I watch my kids beg for pretzles, gold fish and other salty crackers I often worry they are getting too much. If you are too, this might be of interest to you. The recommended daily limit for sodium for 1 to 3 year olds is 1500 mg and less than 1900 mg a day for 4 to 8 year olds. Since all adults should also get less than 2400 mg a day, it is a good idea to monitor this for the whole family. Decreasing your intake of obvious salty foods, processed foods, frozen foods and eating out is a great place to start. Also, increasing your high potassium foods such as fruits and vegetables can help to lessen the effects of sodium on blood pressure. It’s a good idea to start now, not because I’m worried that a 2 year old is going to get high blood pressure from eating too much salt, but because you are helping to shape and develop your child’s taste buds and if all they know is salty food, you better bet they are going to grow up preferring those foods.

Look for low sodium versions of canned and boxed food items such as low sodium beans, tomatoes, crackers, lower sodium mac and cheese, etc. Don’t forget to read the food labels while you grocery shop so that you can avoid buying the high sodium stuff to begin with. Now that you know the number you are looking for, you’ll have a better idea of figuring out what products are high or low. For example, 1 serving (1 oz) of pretzels has around 450 mg of sodium. Sound high? You’re right, it is! A yogurt has about 40-60 mg. That sounds pretty reasonable to me. You can also check the product’s ingredient list which lists ingredients in order of predominance with those used in the greatest amounts first. The lower on the list,the better!

Here are more examples:

1 serving (1 ounce) goldfish   250 mg

1 string cheese   210 mg

1 small bag (1 ounce) cheetos   290 mg

1 serving graham crackers   190 mg

1 serving (1 ounce) honey nut cheerios  190 mg

then we get into common kid’s meals….

McDonals 6 piece chicken nuggets and small fries 758 mg

1 serving (1/3 of box) Kraft Mac & Cheese   580 mg

1 small serving frozen pizza (1/8 of pizza)   440-750 mg depending on brand

You can see how quickly the sodium can add up, right? These foods are very commonly eaten amongst kids and my point is not that they shouldn’t ever eat them, just watch the portion and frequency per day. My son would eat goldfish at every snack if I let him, but the rule is that if he has crackers for one snack, the next snack is fruit. Luckily fruit and vegetables are practically sodium free so you don’t have to worry there! To find the sodium content of other foods check out Calorie King where you can simply enter any food item into the “food search” box and view a nutrition label of that particular item!