smart shopping – The No Salt, No Fat, No Sugar Journal

Product review: Sans Sucre sugar-free mousse and brownies

Baking is not usually my thing, I find it a bit too scientific a process as compared to cooking which allows for more freedom to depart from recipes and become artistic. So most of the recipes you’ll find on this blog are for cooking main courses and side dishes rather than desserts.

That said, I love to eat baked goods such as cakes and doughnuts, items I really should try to avoid on my heart-healthy diet because of sugar and fat they contain.

So when I was approached by a public relations person for a brand called Sans Sucre which makes sugar-free and gluten-free baking mixes, I was intrigued enough by the prospect of guilt-free items that I asked for samples to try to make. (The brand name means without sugar in French, by the way.)

I’ve since tried the sugar-free, low-fat Chocolate Mousse Mix and the sugar-free chocolate fudge brownie mix. Of the two, I enjoyed the mousse more and found it relatively simple to make, even for a baking-challenged cook like me. Continue reading “Product review: Sans Sucre sugar-free mousse and brownies”

Cooking Light goes in for some ‘This is Us’ clickbaiting

Cooking Light often has great recipes, some of which I’ve shared on my recipe page. It’s daily e-mails try, as do many others, to come up with the most provocative subject lines imaginable to get us all to open the newsletters. Recently that included trying to piggyback on the popularity of NBC’s This is Us series.

I found the whole thing goofy enough to blog about it, so indulge me.

The Jan. 27 Cooking Light newsletter came with the subject line “Can Your Crock Pot Really Catch on Fire?” This just after the This is Us episode where a faulty pot burns down a house (if you’re a fan, as I am, you know the rest. I hate that neighbor now, don’t you?)

Clean eating crock pot chicken is a favorite of mine. My wiring is fine.

I chuckled at the topic line not only because I saw it as Cooking Light shamelessly putting out some clickbait tied to This is Us but also because I can just imagine the poor reporter who was assigned that story having to call around to get comments for it.

She ended up talking to customer service at Crock-Pot and quoting someone who had talked about the same topic on the Today show apparently. Continue reading “Cooking Light goes in for some ‘This is Us’ clickbaiting”

First Look: Innit recipe app has lots of easy-to-follow instructions

The creators of the new Innit recipe and cooking app recently asked me to review it. I’m getting some thank-you items in return (a shopping bag, T-shirt and spatula so far, just thought you should know. That’s not enough to really change what I’m about to say one way or another). The app is free, you can download it by clicking here.

My first impression is Innit is suited to people who don’t like to cook or who have never cooked. Its step-by-step videos, some as basic as how to boil water, can take the novice past any jitters about cooking so they can prepare their own meals rather than relying on take-out every night.

The app even provides a shopping list for each dish and can talk to smart appliances (I don’t have a smart oven, so I can’t test that out).

The app also tells you how long it will take to prepare your meal, giving you an end-time. I’m sure type A people will strive to beat that to show just how good they are.

I was able to find 10 possible recipes. The app’s website says you can personalize recipes to take into account allergies, etc. I haven’t found how to do that yet. I’d like to customize the recipes available to take out fat, salt and sugar, my three evil foods.

One salmon teriyaki recipe,for example, has 3,560 mgs of salt, two days supply for me. I’d substitute Mrs. Dash salt-free teriyaki sauce to cut that considerably. I’ll let you know in a subsequent post if I can find a way to do that.

To find nutritional info for each recipe,you tap on the calorie count to reach the nutrition info screen. Continue reading “First Look: Innit recipe app has lots of easy-to-follow instructions”

Another handy way to carry your own oil & vinegar

Salad dressing served in restaurants are loaded with salt, fat and sugar, exactly what you don;t want to put on a healthy salad. I’ve advised in the past that you carry you own olive oil and vinegar to use when dining out. Small packets of each are available on Amazon, i buy them literally by the hundreds.

My new tiny oil and vinegar bottles for eating out.

My resourceful daughter presented me with another option this Christmas when she gave me tiny dressing bottles from Crate & Barrel (full disclosure, she works for the company, so likely got these at a discount. You can get them on the store’s site for $4.95 each). Continue reading “Another handy way to carry your own oil & vinegar”

Expect your food shopping bills to rise in 2018

Last year was a good one for food shoppers with several factors keeping retail prices down. But don’t expect the same in 2018, predicts Cooking Light magazine and the Wall Street Journal.

Smart shopping means buying items low in fat, salt and sugar. Know how to fill your shopping cart while avoiding this evil trio of additives. — Smart shopping means buying items low in fat, salt and sugar. This year, it also will mean watching for sales and bargains as food prices rise.

Commodity prices have been rising but food retailers have absorbed those rather than pass them on to consumers in the face of increased competition from online retailers like Amazon. That could change in 2018. something has to give, basically, retailers can’t keep paying more for what they buy without eventually charging you more for what you buy from them. Continue reading “Expect your food shopping bills to rise in 2018”

Healthier items disappearing from Mariano’s shelves???

I really hope this was a one-time out-of-stock case, but I’m not hopeful of that since I didn’t see shelf tags for either product. Please Mariano’s don’t let me down.

The Mariano’s supermarket chain took Chicago by storm a few years ago, generating so much positive buzz that Kroger in 2015 bought it and it’s parent company, Roundy’s for $800 million.

I've found two brands of low-sodium,low-sugar ketchup, Westbrae and LocalFolks Foods. — Localfolks ketchup, on the right, my favorite.

Mariano’s brought an approach to food sales that Wegman’s is known for on the East Coast — stores with more prepared foods and in-store chefs and eating areas, to the Midwest. What I liked about Mariano’s was that it stocked more low-salt and low-fat products than the major supermarket chains tend to do.

But my latest shopping trip to a Mariano’s in Skokie, Il., caused me some concern about whether that’s all changing under Kroger ownership. I go to Mariano’s specifically to buy three products — Kraft fat-free shredded mozzarella, low-salt canned olives and my favorite low-salt, low-sugar ketchup from Localfolks. But Mariano’s had neither the cheese nor the olives on my latest trip. Continue reading “Healthier items disappearing from Mariano’s shelves???”

NoSaltNoFatNoSugar.com achieves all-time high view total in January

More people are finding us and hearing our message. January was a record month, in fact, for views of our site. NoSaltNoFatNoSugar.com had 6,174 views in January from 3,243 visitors.

The mission for this blog since I started it in late 2012 has been to help people with health issues eat tasty, satisfying food rather than just the bland stuff nutritionists propose after a major health incident such as my angioplasty in 2012.

Those in my family who have died from heart attacks. I miss them all.

But helping people is only possible if they’re listening, otherwise I’m just another tree falling in the forest, unknown and unseen and not helping anyone.

So it’s been gratifying to see our visitor traffic building year after year. More people are finding us and hearing our message. January was a record month, in fact, for views of our site. NoSaltNoFatNoSugar.com had 6,174 views in January from 3,243 visitors. Continue reading “NoSaltNoFatNoSugar.com achieves all-time high view total in January”