Veggie Products Just As Salty As Meat Varieties

Vegetarian sausages and burgers are misleading health -conscious consumers with many just as salty as meat varieties, a new study has revealed.
Research carried out by health group CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health) found that some brands of veggie burgers and sausages contain the same of salt as five bags of crisps.
The saltiest product tested was a Fry’s Vegetarian Traditional Sausage, which contained 2.8g of salt per sausage – the highest in the study – and nearly half the maximum recommended daily limit for an adult of 6g.
In contrast, one pork sausage from Sainsburys contained just 0.7g of salt – a quarter the amount of the vegetarian option.
The Fry brand was also found responsible for producing the saltiest burger with 1.8g of salt in each, making them six times saltier than an Asda meat burger .
Other products tested included Cauldron’s vegetarian sausages, with two found to contain 2g of salt – over 40 per cent more than the 1.2g found in two Asda Meat Free Lincolnshire Sausages .
As a result of the findings, the research team warned shoppers to check the labelling carefully to ensure they buy products which are lower in salt.
“Our research shows that vegetarian burgers and sausages are just as salty as meat equivalent products and some are considerably higher in salt than others,” commented CASH nutritionist Carrie Bolt.
“We would urge people to look carefully at the labelling to help make sure that they are buying lower-salt products wherever they can.”
“Confusingly, many of these products give only the sodium levels on pack. These need to be multiplied by 2.5 to get the salt levels,” she added.