10 sneaky sources of too much salt in your diet

Flavored potato chips, movie popcorn, even cereals – anything that comes in a box, can, or from a factory and that is not in its natural form anymore tends to have a higher sodium content, said Lenox Hill Hospital diet and fitness expert Sharon Zarabi.

“Potatoes become potato chips, flour becomes crackers, a grilled chicken breast becomes chicken tenders. Taking something from the farm and making it into a dish, an item, companies add salt,” said Zarabi.

Kids are especially vulnerable to this category of salty staples. “Kids eat a lot more processed food altogether. Its’ quick, easy, tastes good and the products are marketed to kids,” she said.

The CDC report said children should be getting no more than 2,200 milligrams of sodium a day in their diets, yet it found that boys ages 9 to 13 consumed another 1,100 milligrams of sodium above that level, and girls overshot the mark by 800 milligrams.

“I was shocked by the amount of sodium young children are eating,” said Dana Hunnes, senior dietitian at Ronald Reagan-UCLA Medical Center.

“Become a label reader,” Zarabi advises kids and adults. Compare similar dishes or different brands of canned and packaged foods. Sometimes the same product, a can of beans by two different companies, for example, can have very different sodium levels, she said.