With the recent release of Federal dietary guidelines (2015-2020 edition of Dietary Guidelines), there were recommendations that American should have better eating habits, which includes reducing our intake of added sugar and salt.  The problem is that many American do not cook for themselves anymore, or if they do, they cook up frozen, microwavable, or canned meals.

Most food we eat at restaurants, or have delivered, typically have high amounts of sugar and salt to make them more favorable — this way the restaurant can add flavor and taste inexpensively, by avoiding having to instead use other more expensive herbs and flavorings to provide aroma, flavor and taste. This is also true of frozen, microwavable, or canned vegetables, fruits, and meals, as well as in sauces and dressings.The problem many of us face is that when we get home from work, we want to eat quickly, and given that many of us are single, or both people in the relationship work, there is little time to cook when we get home, so we fall back up the convenience of pre-made food, eating out, or delivery.

For example, canned spaghetti sauce you buy in the store has a lot of added sugar, salt and unnecessary calories. Instead, here are two options for a quick and healthy pasta meal:

— Option 1.  Get fresh tomatoes (plum, cherry etc.), or use crushed canned tomatoes (I like Scalafina, even though it does have some salt), put that in a small pot, and add black pepper, paprika, chives, cayenne pepper, and crushed chili pepper to taste. Heat in a pot under medium heat until warm.  If you want, you can also add some olive oil to the sauce. Then cook up whole wheat spaghetti, drain the water from the pot it was cooking in, and add flavored tomatoes or your sauce and toss. For an even more nutritious meal, add broccoli to the homemade sauce, and fresh grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese.

Option 2.  Cook the spaghetti as in option 1, drain, and make sure all the water is removed from the pot you used. Then add back the spaghetti into the pot, and add extra virgin olive oil seasoning with black pepper, crushed chili peppers, chives and fresh grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese to taste. Broccoli can also be added, or small florets of cauliflower or Romanesco broccoli (a green and more tasty cauliflower).

Both these meals can be cooked and prepared in 15 minutes, and have minimal cleanup, plus you can limit the amount of salt, add flavor by using other seasonings, and not use any sugar, which is used in most bottled or canned sauces.

Another tip is to stay away from sugared drinks (or artificially flavored drinks), including sodas and sports drinks. As I have discussed in previous posts, I like having unsweetened ice tea for a beverage, and brew my own ice tea (call Sportea) for use as sports drink. I have not had a soda or sports drink for over 6 years, and do not miss it a bit.

Another way to limit sugar and salt is the grill your fish, chicken or meat on a stove-top cast iron pan, like the one pictured above, and then dress up the grilled fish, chicken, or meat with fresh salsa, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, or various other toppings. I use this technique all the time, and in addition, on the weekend, I buy various fresh vegetables, put them in microwavable containers, spray olive olive on the chopped up vegetable, and the season with various herbs and spices. In about 4-5 minutes in the microwave, vegetables are ready, and for the whole week, I can put together healthy, nutritious, and salt/sugar free meals in less than 30 minutes. Delivery or eating out is not even that quick, plus there are real cost savings to cooking the meals yourself.

So let’s cook more, and by doing so, cut down on the sugar and salt we eat.