Joel’s Low-Sodium, Low-Fat, Turkey Meatloaf

Since I’ve been working on my series on dieting and metabolism, I’ve neglected posting some of my new recipes. This turkey meatloaf has good flavor by itself, and is good with salsa, low-sodium catsup, or mustard. I like to put a slice inside a whole wheat pita with some thinly sliced onions and mustard for lunch. Two slices make a good entrée for dinner accompanied by vegetables, a salad, and either a baked potato or baked sweet potato with non-fat sour cream. I boosted the protein and kept the sodium very low by using soy bread crumbs; if these aren’t available, you can substitute bread crumbs. This recipe makes 12 slices. Each slice contains 68.58 calories, 13.14 g protein, 3.29 g carbohydrates, .78 g fiber, .41 g fat, and 67.17 mg sodium.

Ingredients

19.2 oz. white ground turkey breast (I used Honeysuckle White)
1/3 C soy bread crumbs
3 T egg whites
½ C chopped sweet onion
1 T chili powder
2 T prepared mustard
3 T sodium free catsup
Cavender’s salt free all purpose Greek seasoning-to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the catsup, mix remaining ingredients, and form into a loaf. Place loaf into a shallow pan and cover tightly with aluminum foil. Bake for 1 hour, remove foil and spread 2 tablespoons of catsup over the top of the load. Return the loaf to the oven uncovered for 15-20 minutes. Allow to cool for 10 minutes before slicing.

Here is my recap for the last two days.

Daily Dietary Recap-6/2/2007
Calories	Protein	Carbohydrates	Sodium	Fat	% Calories from Fat
1227.62	83.63 g	204.13 g	1150.72 mg	13.55 g	8.79%

Daily Dietary Recap-6/3/2007
Calories	Protein	Carbohydrates	Sodium	Fat	% Calories from Fat
1080.31	57.79 g	215.17 g	705.91 mg	13.97 g	10.04%

Hidden Sodium in Supermarket Meats

Naively walking into the supermarket to purchase food for my first days of dieting, I assumed that lean meats such as boneless skinless chicken breasts, lean ground beef, turkey, and perhaps a lean steak in small portions, would become staple meat protein sources for my diet. I bought Tyson chicken breasts, Honeysuckle White ground turkey patties, and extra lean ground beef (96/4) thinking they would be among the lowest in fat and sodium. I was right about the fat, but very wrong about the sodium.

As I logged what I ate and its nutrient content, I was surprised to find that the chicken breasts and ground turkey each contained 200 mg of sodium per 4 oz. portion. The extra lean ground beef was a reasonable 55 mg. I had shopped at our local Wal-Mart Supercenter and assumed that as the largest supermarket, it would have what I needed. Boy was I wrong. I found that all of their beef except the extra lean ground beef was treated with flavor enhancers containing sodium. Of the beef I surveyed, the range of sodium was from 200-390 mg of sodium. Beef naturally contains about 50-55 mg of sodium. Many poultry products are brined, or soaked in a solution that adds weight, ostensibly flavor, and of course, sodium. Poultry naturally contains about the same 50-55 mg of sodium, as does natural pork. The only meat I buy there now is the extra lean ground beef, and occasionally a minimally processed ground white turkey.

I made a trip to the other supermarket (our largest town is only 6000 people and the whole county only has a population of 20,000) and talked with the butcher. He explained that Wal-Mart packages their meats at a remote location and ships them in, so they use flavor enhancers the keep the meats fresh-looking after the time they spend on the road traveling to our store. Tyson makes an all-natural chicken, but Wal-Mart doesn’t routinely carry it. Fortunately, the other store doesn’t enhance their meats and carries some minimally-processed poultry under the names, Tyson All-Natural, Air-Chilled, and Smart Chicken.

I’ve always been a dedicated supermarket package reader and I celebrated the requirement for nutrition information on packages, but, I was unprepared for this development in meats. (My wife understands why it takes me so long to shop; she just doesn’t want to come along.) The admonition here is that we don’t have to settle for high-sodium over processed meats. Read the labels and talk with the butchers.

Daily Dietary Recap-3/12/2007
Calories	Protein	Carbohydrates	Sodium	Fat	% Calories from Fat
1106.29	58.07 g	175.40 g	691.17 mg	19.94 g	16.22%