High Potassium Foods

Once you are aware of the main categories of high potassium foods discussed in the last post, you can begin to plan a transition to a diet of high potassium foods. Most people cannot change all at once. The change in taste may be too much. Most Americans are used to the high salt and high sugar taste. They have been tasting food with those tastes their entire life. And if you are in charge of the meals for the entire family, you don’t have to please just yourself, but you have to please the kids also.

Plan to just change a few things at a time. For many of us the easiest place to start is to eat out less. Fifty percent of meals in America are eaten out.

If you eat restaurant food, whether at the restaurant or by taking it home, you will be getting such a large load of sodium that it will be almost impossible to get enough potassium to satisfy the 3 to 1 ratio of potassium to sodium that is healthy. The problems with fast foods are discussed here and sit-down restaurants here. Of 357 fast foods listed in the National Database, only 17 are high potassium foods. Sit-down restaurants did no better.

If you reduce the number of times you eat out, the sodium load will be much easier to overcome. More restaurants are starting to provide local food that does not have to be loaded with sodium as a preservative, but they are still in the very small minority. Even salads at the average fast food place will have a load of sodium when the dressing is added.

You also should eliminate the prepared, packaged meals at the grocery, such as Stouffer’s, Healthy Choice, Campbell or other prepared meals and entrees that are in the USDA National Nutrient Database. They are all high in sodium to extend shelf life. None of those in the National Database have a favorable ratio of potassium to sodium.

The second step is to find what foods you like. By looking at the tables on this website, you can note the foods you like and begin to think of ways to introduce them into your meals by substituting them for high sodium foods. The last two posts have multiple links to the tables. Or you can download many of the tables by signing up below. 

The food groups that will provide the biggest change in potassium and sodium are the fruits and vegetables. These foods would be the best place to start. Substitute some of the high potassium fruits and vegetables for those you eat that are not in the tables in the above links. By eating them uncooked, steamed, grilled or baked, depending on the exact food, you will not lose the potassium in the food. By not using salt in a marinade or sauce, you will keep the sodium content down.

By going step by step and not changing everything at once, you can transition to a healthier and healthier diet. You will discover new ways to prepare foods and new tastes while reducing your chances of osteoporosis and high blood pressure, as well as their associated health problems.

Many people may feel they need more high potassium foods in their diet, but don’t know how to start. The best way is to start 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.

Most of the diet should be from fruits and vegetables. 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 can provide plenty of potassium.

If you then 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. A vegetables table can be found here. Fruit, dried fruit, dairy, nuts, spices, beef, poultry, fish and other seafood tables by clicking on the links.

However, the quickest way to get a set of tables is to get the table PDFs emailed from the form at the bottom of the page. The first table has 200 of the highest potassium containing foods. A new table with the highest potassium foods in a different category is sent every few days.

When we talk of the categories of food, it means the food as it comes from nature. Fruit loops and strawberry tarts are not part of the fruit category. Veggie burgers are not a vegetable even though they are made from a vegetable.

If it has been ground up and commercially processed, it is not in any of the categories. It still may be okay, but the odds are against it. If it has been soaked in or injected with sodium (salt), it does not fit into a high potassium food. This will eliminate a lot of meat and a lot of canned goods. Many sources of meat have been injected with salt as a preservative.

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 be eating as healthy a diet as possible.

When you are not getting enough potassium, symptoms are often absent. Although technically not symptoms, hypertension and bone loss are two of the most common effects of not getting enough potassium in the diet. High potassium foods are the best preventive for these two problems, as well as for prevention of kidney stones. Because of the type food that high potassium foods are, it is also the best diet for lowering your chance of heart disease and stroke.

Energy loss and fatigue are common symptoms of potassium lack. But fatigue can occur from so many factors that it is not a reliable way to tell if you are lacking potassium. Statistically, though, odds are that at least some of your fatigue is from inadequate potassium intake. Most Americans consume less than half the recommended amount of potassium. So if energy loss is from inadequate potassium intake, it will improve on a diet of high potassium foods.

Sodium and potassium balance each other out. Sodium and potassium are like the yin and yang of our body’s fluid system. They influence what is kept in our body and in our cells, and what is thrown out. When we get lots of sodium it tells the kidneys to get rid of sodium. Calcium always accompanies the sodium. So the calcium comes out of the bones, leading to osteoporosis with less dense and more fragile bones, and goes into the urine where it can form the most common kind of kidney stones.

Calcium movement also affects our nerve cell and muscle cells. When a nerve cell fires or a muscle cell contracts (including the heart muscle cells and the smooth muscle cells in the blood vessels), it does so because sodium goes from outside the cell to inside the cell and potassium goes the opposite way.

Calcium runs in with the sodium. However getting the calcium out of the cell is not so easy. The calcium has to be exchanged for sodium. There are several pumps and exchangers in our cell membranes to do this. But if there is too much sodium and not enough potassium, not enough calcium gets pushed out.

If not enough calcium gets out of the cell, the muscle cells do not relax fully. When the smooth muscle cells of our blood vessels do not relax, our blood pressure rises and we become hypertensive. When the muscles of our body, such as those in our neck and back, do not relax, we feel tenser and tire more easily.

So the symptoms are subtle and often unnoticed in the early stages. High blood pressure often is unnoticed until there is a stroke or heart attack. Osteoporosis is often unnoticed until a bone is broken. Fatigue and tiredness can be caused by so many things, that we don’t notice how much is due to inadequate potassium.

There are ways to check on whether we are getting enough potassium in our diet. But what you might think is the most obvious – the blood test for potassium – is not the way to check. Potassium is so important that the blood level is kept normal even when our diet is seriously lacking. A normal blood level of potassium is meaningless in terms of diet.

Since high blood pressure is usually without symptoms, you will need to get your blood pressure measured. If blood pressure is high or high normal, lack of potassium in the diet may be the culprit. You can often go to a pharmacy and they will check your blood pressure, or you can get a home blood pressure unit for little money.

If your blood pressure is high or high normal, you may want to try a high potassium diet to see if you can lower it. For those on medication for hypertension, often the dose can be reduced or even eliminated.

For osteoporosis, there is a scan to check bone density. The DEXA scan will check how strong your bones are. This test is usually ordered by your doctor. It can show early bone loss, osteopenia, before there are any symptoms, and before the loss becomes osteoporosis.

Another way for your doctor to check if you are losing too much calcium is by checking the calcium in your urine. This will detect calcium loss even before the bone loss will show up on a DEXA scan.

But the best way to determine if you are getting enough potassium in your diet is to count the potassium and sodium you consume in a day. Keep track of all the food you eat in a day, including the approximate weight of the food items. Then look up the amount of potassium and sodium they contain in the multiple tables here on the website. If you are getting 4700 mg of potassium and less than 1500 mg of sodium, you are eating like the healthiest people on the planet.

New Year’s Day has come and gone. For those with osteoporosis a good resolution would be to stop its progression or even reverse it. For those in their 20s and 30s a good resolution would be to prevent it from developing in the first place. With a diet of high potassium foods, bones will be stronger.

Although bone density is affected by many factors, one of the most important for Americans today is the potassium and sodium in the diet. Very few of us get the advised amount of potassium daily, and almost all of us get too much sodium. Over 95% of men and 75% of women in America consume more than the upper limit suggested for sodium. Most of us get less than half the recommended potassium.

Sodium and potassium are important because they counterbalance each other. If we consume too much sodium (from salt, often hidden in processed food), it must be eliminated. It is passed out in the urine. Sodium is important in osteoporosis because calcium always accompanies sodium in the urine. If a lot of sodium is consumed, it must be eliminated in the urine and a lot of calcium is eliminated with it.

Potassium counters the sodium effect on calcium and helps preserve it. It does this by affecting a hormone acting on the kidney in the opposite way that sodium does. It tells the hormone to tell the kidney to stop eliminating so much sodium and thus the calcium is not eliminated either. 

Unlike blood pressure, a change in bone density is not seen in two weeks. But if your doctor checks your urine for calcium, within a month of being on a high potassium diet you should see less calcium being lost in the urine if your osteoporosis is from too much sodium and not enough potassium in your diet. If you have this kind of improvement, a diet of high potassium foods will help your osteoporosis.

The high potassium diet consists of getting more than 4700 mg of potassium and less than 1500 mg of sodium a day. It consists of many high potassium vegetables and fruits, nuts, some dairy and some meat from beef, poultry, or fish. Because so much of the fat Americans consume is saturated, the dairy should be low fat or non-fat, and the beef and poultry should be lean.

Adding certain spices, dried fruit, and flavors such as Dutched cocoa, as well as small amounts of molasses or sorghum syrup can add variety while boosting your potassium intake.

It’s the last week of the year. Time to make New Year’s resolutions. The most common resolution is to lose weight. Another good resolution is to improve your blood pressure if you have high blood pressure. A perfect way to start for either of these is to begin a diet of high potassium foods. For most of us a high potassium diet will result in a lower blood pressure. Because of the foods in a high potassium diet, most of us will feel more energetic and lose weight over time.

The effect from a high potassium diet on blood pressure can be seen within 2 weeks, so you will know right away if it is working. If it is going to help you, you will know before February. If you go on a high potassium diet by eating high potassium foods, you will also be lowering your sodium intake, since almost all of the high potassium foods have little sodium. The IOM recommendation of 4700 mg of potassium and less than 1500 mg of sodium is easily attained on a high potassium foods diet.

How to start? The easiest way is to start with breakfast. Smoothies or cooked cereal can be made high potassium by including some of the high potassium foods in the tables we have on the website here and here. Lunch and dinner can be easy also.

For lunch, a raw vegetable and a fruit, as well as a few nuts and some dairy such as milk to drink, with a small portion of meat or poultry will do. If the food has not been highly processed, which often results in a higher sodium load, just taking a portion from each of these groups can result in a high potassium diet.

The vegetables table here will give you a list to choose from for the vegetable. Just eat it raw or steam it and it will lose no potassium. Cooking by boiling will leach out the potassium and should be avoided. Of course, fruit is usually eaten raw.

The nuts will add a lot of potassium in a small volume, and give healthy fats (unless coconut). Walnuts and macadamias are good choices. Using olive oil for salads provides a healthy fat, but gives no potassium.

Most meats will have a favorable potassium to sodium ratio, unless they have been injected with sodium for preservation. If you choose from the poultry and fish categories or wild game, you will also be getting healthy fats in an appropriate amount.

And finally, dairy has a favorable potassium to sodium ratio except for cheese. Cheese generally has much more sodium than potassium and should be avoided or minimized.

A good New Year’s resolution is to switch to a high potassium foods diet to reduce blood pressure. It will also help to strengthen your bone density. And over the long run, it will help to bring your weight into the normal range.

It’s the time of year for dietary indiscretion. Every party has loads of food. Many of the gifts that we give each other are food, often some sort of sweet or dessert. It is not a time for thinking whether a food is a high potassium food or low potassium food.

Often candy is given this time of year. Most candy with chocolate has a lot of potassium, since cocoa is a high potassium food. The best candies for someone on a low potassium diet are those without chocolate.

The quantity of candy listed as a serving in the table is important to notice. Often the reason the food is a low potassium food is that the serving is less than many of us consume at a sitting. So use the serving size as a guide to how much you can allow yourself.

Of course, the best path is to avoid the candies and eat only the appropriate foods with nutritional value. But we all will break the rule every once in a while. The table is to help you figure out how much you can break the rule safely. The table shows which candies are lower in potassium and gives the sodium content, since this also is an important consideration.

The weights all are grams except for the potassium and sodium, which are milligrams. The calories, protein, fat, carbohydrate, fiber, sugar, potassium and sodium values given are for 100 grams of food.

As usual, K is potassium, and Na is sodium.

Except for the potassium to sodium ratio, amount of potassium per serving, and sodium per serving (all of which we calculated), the source of data is:

USDA National Nutrient Database Standard Reference – Release 22 

There are a great many baked goods that are low potassium foods. Cakes and cookies are no exception. A great many cakes will provide less than 100 mg of potassium in a slice of cake, and a great many cookies will provide less than 100 mg of potassium in a cookie.

In the table we have included these low potassium cakes and cookies. However, we have also included some with a higher potassium content to point out how some cakes and cookies will have a high potassium content. Those with chocolate, cheese, pineapple, fruit, ginger or other high potassium spices or ingredients will have a higher potassium content. For example, we included a yellow cake that has a vanilla frosting and one with a chocolate frosting to show how much even the frosting can make a difference in the potassium content.

As with almost all baked goods, the cakes and cookies have a lot of sodium. If you need to restrict potassium, you probably also need to restrict sodium, at least somewhat. The sodium content of baked goods is typically high. That is true for cakes and cookies too, except for those in the table that are special dietary with low sodium.

The table has a lot of commercial products to show the content of commercial products versus homemade. Typically homemade baked goods will have just as much sodium as commercial, since it takes the same amount of baking soda or powder to make, whether it is commercial or homemade.

A great many Archway cookies are in the table since they were the main brand studied by the USDA. The Archway cookies vary widely in their potassium and sodium content, depending on the exact ingredients. Other commercial baked goods would be expected to vary in a similar fashion.

If someone has a medical condition requiring a low potassium diet, they will need to regulate multiple aspects of their diet, not just potassium and sodium. They need advice from a physician and/or a dietitian to help with all aspects. These tables will be inadequate for managing their health, and are only meant to serve as a guide, showing how foods that seem similar will vary in significant dietary components.

The weights all are grams except for the potassium and sodium, which are milligrams. The calories, protein, fat, carbohydrate, fiber, sugar, potassium and sodium values given are for 100 grams of food.

As usual, K is potassium, and Na is sodium.

Except for the potassium to sodium ratio, amount of potassium per serving, and sodium per serving (all of which we calculated), the source of data is:

USDA National Nutrient Database Standard Reference – Release 22

The temptations of the season are difficult to avoid this time of year, with everyone wanting you to sample their latest baking success. For most baked goods there should not be a problem with potassium for those who require a low potassium diet. Most baked goods are low potassium foods, with only a few of the biscuits, rolls and muffins being high potassium foods. Those with a high amount of potassium will be the various baked goods that are made to include fruit, nuts, spice, chocolate, bran, whole grain or mixed grain.

Sodium will be high in all the biscuits, rolls and muffins, though. All baked goods have high sodium content unless they specifically mention that they are low sodium. Getting too much sodium will result in retaining extra fluid. Although consuming too much potassium will make the heart beat irregularly in those requiring a low potassium diet, too much sodium will make the heart work too hard, since it has to move the extra fluid in the blood stream, and supply blood to the muscles that move a body carrying extra weight from the fluid.

The table below includes most bagels, biscuits, rolls and muffins although there are too many products to include all the brand variations available. The commercial bakeries tend to prepare the baked goods with similar processing using baking soda or baking powder, which adds sodium.

We have included the fat, carbohydrate and sodium amounts since those usually need to be regulated in addition to potassium. If the only requirement is low potassium, the baked goods listed will help. They are all less than 100 mg potassium in a serving, except for the foods that have high potassium ingredients added, such as bran, whole or mixed grain, or fruit, milk or spices.

But people with medical conditions requiring a low potassium diet most often need multiple aspects of their diet regulated, and need the advice of a doctor and dietitian to help with their specific requirements. These tables will be inadequate for managing their health, and can only serve as a guide to show how foods that seem similar will vary significantly in important dietary elements.

The weights all are grams except for the potassium and sodium, which are milligrams. The calories, protein, fat, carbohydrate, fiber, sugar, potassium and sodium values given are for 100 grams of food.

As usual, K is potassium, and Na is sodium.

Except for the potassium to sodium ratio, amount of potassium per serving, and sodium per serving (all of which we calculated), the source of data is:

USDA National Nutrient Database Standard Reference – Release 22