Healthy Snacks, Beef Jerky, and Nitrates
May 31, 2007
Q: In you Nutrition Quest 3 article you mentioned Beef jerky as a snack. All
the products readily available to me contain nitrates. I’m guessing these
are used as preservatives. Whats your take?
A: Nitrates aren’t really something you want to consume a lot of. If you really want to add some beef jerky to your diet as an “on the go snack” I’d look around some more. Gas stations and convenience stores are often the best places to find local beef jerky. The local brands are more likely not to have all the preservatives. I mentioned in the article making your own jerky, which is a good option. But the price of corn is going up (because of the new ethanol fuel craze) so beef is getting more expensive, thus this may not be the most cost effective option.
Sodium is also something that you should keep in mind. If you don’t eat a lot of processed foods to start out with then the extra sodium from beef jerky might not be an issue. But often 1 serving of beef jerky has 800mg of sodium. I know I usually eat the whole bag in one sitting (at least 2 servings). Doing this twice a day wouldn’t be the best idea.
When traveling I find a packet of beef jerky and a small (1oz) bag of cashews to be the ultimate high protein convenience snack. If you only eat beef jerky on those occasions then you probably don’t have to worry about having a little bit of nitrates.
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