Researchers Figure Out How to Remove Salt and Saturated Fat from Popular Foods

New proof-of-concept research involving 10 recipes demonstrates that using herbs/spices to create flavor enhanced, healthier versions of commonly consumed foods has significant potential to lower intake of saturated fat and sodium; blind taste testing showed that for seven out of the 10 reformulated recipes, overall liking was rated as superior or at parity with the non-reformulated version.

Petersen et al. suggest that using herbs/spices to create flavor-enhanced recipes lower in overconsumed dietary components has the potential to reduce intake and is acceptable to consumers. Image credit: Congerdesign.

“Foods lower in saturated fat, sodium, and added sugars (i.e., overconsumed dietary components) must have an acceptable flavor profile to promote intake,” said Penn State researcher Kristina Petersen.

“The aim of our research was to model the impact of using herbs/spices as flavor-enhancers when reducing overconsumed dietary components in commonly consumed foods and evaluate acceptance of these flavor-enhanced reformulations.”

For the study, Dr. Petersen and her colleagues used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey to identify 10 of the most popular foods that are typically high in sodium, added sugars and saturated fat. These included meatloaf, chicken pot pie, macaroni and cheese, and brownies.

Next, they worked with culinary experts to develop three versions of these recipes.

The first contained typical amounts of saturated fat, sugar and salt used in these recipes. The second version was nutritionally improved by removing the excess saturated fat, sugar and salt. The third version had the same nutrient profile as the second version, but also contained added herbs and spices, such as garlic powder, ground mustard seed, cayenne, cumin, rosemary, thyme, cinnamon and vanilla extract.

For example, the typical macaroni and cheese recipe included salted butter, 2% milk, American cheese and salt.

For the nutritionally improved version, the researchers swapped the salted butter for unsalted butter and reduced the amount in the recipe by 75%.

They swapped the 2% milk for skim milk, replaced some of the American cheese with reduced fat cheese, and eliminated the extra salt.

For the nutritionally improved, plus herbs and spices, version, the researchers added onion powder, garlic powder, ground mustard seed, paprika and cayenne.

“Our goal was to see how much we could lower these overconsumed ingredients without affecting the overall properties of the food in terms of mouthfeel and structure, and then add in herbs and spices to improve the flavor,” Dr. Petersen said.

The researchers then conducted blind taste tests featuring each of the 10 recipes.

The participants evaluated all three versions of a dish, one at a time, in a single session. Between 85 and 107 consumers completed each test.

They rated several aspects of acceptability for each recipe, including overall liking and attribute liking, such as the food’s appearance, flavor and texture. They then ranked the dishes in order of preference.

“We found that adding herbs and spices restored the overall liking to the level of the original food in seven of the ten recipes,” Dr. Petersen said.

“In fact, participants actually liked some of the recipes better than the originals.”

Specifically, participants liked the healthier, flavor-enhanced versions of the brownies and chicken in cream sauce significantly more than the original recipes.

For five of the dishes — meatloaf, chili, apple pie, pasta with meat sauce and taco meat — participants liked the healthier, flavor-enhanced versions about the same as the original versions.

They liked the healthier, flavor-enhanced cheese pizza, mac and cheese, and chicken pot pie recipes less than the original versions.

Finally, the authors modeled the potential impact of 25 to 100% of U.S. adult consumers eating these recipes instead of the original recipes.

For both saturated fat and salt, they found that the estimated daily reduction would be about 3% if 25% of consumers adopted the healthier recipes versus about 11.5% if 100% of consumers adopted the healthier recipes.

Smaller estimated reductions in added sugars were observed across the modeled range of consumer adoption.

“We demonstrated a meaningful reduction in overconsumed nutrients is possible with modification of these 10 recipes, and these changes are acceptable to consumers,” Dr. Petersen said.

“This suggests that more research should be done to look at how to implement this more broadly, how to educate people to make these kinds of changes.”

“Importantly, these findings could be applied to the food supply because most foods that people consume are purchased in a prepared form. I think that would have a profound impact on people’s health.”

The findings were published July 31, 2023 in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

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Kristina S. Petersen et al. Using herbs/spices to enhance the flavor of commonly consumed foods reformulated to be lower in overconsumed dietary components is an acceptable strategy and has the potential to lower intake of saturated fat and sodium: A National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey analysis & blind tasting. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, published online July 31, 2023; doi: 10.1016/j.jand.2023.07.025