Thoughts for Thursday

Life is all about balance, right?  Here's a list of some "good" and "not the best" (NTB) choices I have made over the past 24 hours......

Dinner of grilled chicken and roasted vegetables = Good
1 hour Zumba class = Good
Bowl of Breyer's Blast Waffle Cone Ice Cream (our fave) = NTB
Breakfast of pancakes = NTB
Morning jog = Good
Can of Chicken Vegetable Soup for lunch = ?

That last one had me stumped.  I think soup is generally good for you.  Chicken and vegetables are good for you.  Although I know most canned items are high in sodium.  How bad is too much salt?  Does it really matter?  So during lunch I googled this mystery on my phone.  I was also in search of the healthiest of canned soups.  The soup I had today is the one pictured in the middle.  According to http://www.sparkpeople.com, my soup did well on their 4 criteria for a healthy soup.  Although mine was 1 gram short on fiber.  They suggested a soup 250 calories or less, 3 grams of fat or less, 3 grams of fiber or more, and less than 600mg of sodium.

Looking further I found on http://www.marksdailyapple.com the answer to my question on salt.  Besides fluid retention, salt directly impacts blood pressure. It also is linked to osteoporosis, asthma, kidney disease and stomach cancer. The worst culprit in most soups though is MSG. Not good stuff.  It can cause headaches, chest pain, rapid heartbeat and drowsiness.

Anyways, thankfully I could keep eating because my soup did not have high sodium or MSG.  However, my soup was not organic... so surely I downed some pesticides... which grosses me out.  People tend to think buying organic is froo-froo, but it is actually just smart.  Although, yes it is a little more expensive and sometimes harder to find.  And yes, our generation did not grow up eating all organic, but the food market is changing.  Why choose pesticides and hormones over organic if given the option?  As I once heard on Oprah, pay more now or pay more at the doc's later in life.  I am getting off on a tangent though and I am no expert in this field.  So anyways, I did have some organic soup on hand.  After comparing labels, I found my organic soups were higher in sodium. Where is the balance?

Enter http://www.livestrong.com.  They did the research and claim the healthiest soup choice is Amy's Kitchen Lentil Vegetable Soup Light in Sodium.  Organic, free of artificial additives and MSG, and lowest in sodium.  It also provides more nutrients than other soups: 7g protein, 8g fiber, 45%RDA of vitamin A, and 20%RDA of vitamin C.

So I am now on the lookout for this soup!  There you have it folks.  Some thoughts on soup for Thursday.  Homemade soup is probably the way to go, but cooking multiple meals a day is another thought for another Thursday.  That's all from this soup nerd.  Have a great Thursday!:)