Many people feel they need more high potassium foods in their diet. But they don't know how to start. The best way to start is with the big 5. Fruits and vegetables, dairy, and nuts are the three biggest sources. Add beef, poultry or fish, and spices and you have the big 5.
How Much From Each Group?
Most of the diet should come from fruits and vegetables. And a good amount should come from dairy, some from nuts and a meat, and a small amount from spice. This gives a well rounded meal as far as macro and micronutrients, and provides plenty of potassium.
Then, if you pick the high potassium foods from each category by using the tables on this website, you will reach the recommended 4700 mg of potassium and less than 1500 mg of sodium easily, despite the “mathematically impossible” pronouncement of a recent dietitian. You will find a vegetables table here. And you will find fruit, dried fruit, dairy, nuts, spices, beef, poultry, fish and other seafood tables by clicking on the links.
What Is Food?
When we talk of the categories of food, it means food as it comes from nature. The food categories do not include highly processed food. Consequently, fruit loops and strawberry tarts are not part of the fruit category. And veggie burgers are not a vegetable, even though the patties come from a vegetable.
If it is ground up and commercially processed, it is not in any of the categories. Still, it may be okay. But the odds are against it. If soaked in or injected with sodium (salt), it is not a high potassium food. Consequently, this will eliminate a lot of meat, and a lot of canned goods. Salt is a preservative often injected into many sources of meat. And salt is a preservative often added to canned goods.
Although it is the main factor leading to a healthy diet, potassium is not the only factor. But by eating a diet of high potassium foods, and paying attention to just a few other factors, you will eat as healthy a diet as possible.
