The Battle of American food, revisited
There are reports this morning that the Food and Drug Administration is holding hearings concerning a subject that depresses me every time I go shopping at the local grocery store. As I wrote in the series “The Battle of American Food” in August, located in the August archives, there is almost nothing available that isn't loaded with salt.
My store already has a condescending attitude concerning sugar-free foods. They have these bones that they can throw me, over here someplace. During Thanksgiving, they ran out of sugar-free pumpkin pie, while there was enough sugar-based food to power a fleet of humvees.
The store changed hands, and in the process changed their soda distributor. Previously there were several sugar-free varieties of house brand soda. Now they have one, sugar-free cola. With that perspective in place, I know they will do nothing to provide us with salt-free or low sodium alternatives.
Those who merchandise pre-packaged food see no market in providing the food that I and millions of other Americans need. In the news reports I heard this morning, they said that the stuff loaded with salt can bring us hypertension. Back in the day I was diagnosed with high-blood pressure after eating pre-packaged food from the time I was able to sit properly at the Formica kitchen table.
I might want a can of cream of mushroom soup today, but even the lower-sodium alternative would send my 2,000 milligram sodium budget into a tailspin. If one existed that I could eat, it would be priced so high that, as a starving student, I cannot afford it. I have to avoid all the processed meat products, from sausages and hot dogs to any pre-packaged sliced beef.
While that means I have to do without so much of the food that I grew up with, my blood-pressure has gone down, and my ankles don't swell at all. This is a change I can deal with, but not happily. The lesson I learned with sugar is that it easier for me to do without than for the grocers to provide me with something that will make me happy.
If I have the problem though, imagine what the rest of America faces, and doesn't see.