Some good advice here already. I only have to add 'Persevere'. Honestly, it really doesn't take long to get used to what you call 'blandness'. It took me about a week, and now I add salt to nothing at all. If salt is added, I really, really notice it! That blandness isn't bland at all - it's just not salty any more! Up until now, the only thing you've really tasted is the salt - your taste-buds are attuned to salt, and not much else. Give it time, and soon you'll be getting the REAL taste of food! Meantime, keep well away from processed and packaged foods, frozen meals, take-aways etc. Even make your own bread. I can't comment from my own experience, but I do know from people who have travelled to America find the bread 'over there' is incredibly salty compared with what we get over here - make your own instead, using an absolute minimum of salt, or none at all. Use unsalted butter. Keep away from soft-drinks (carbonated colas and such - they have a lot of salt in them). Start using more herbs. Fresh is best, but dried is better than nothing. Here's a couple of salt-substitute herb mixtures you could try. You don't need to follow the recipes exactly if you don't have all the ingredients: Herbal Salt Substitute (1) 1/4 cup dried parsley 1/4 cup dried savory 1/4 cup dried savory 1/4 cup dried thyme 2 tablespoons dried marjoram Grind all ingredients together. Herbal Salt Substitute (2) 3 tablespoons dried basil 3 tablespoons dried marjoram 3 tablespoons dried parsley 3 tablespoons dried thyme 4 1/2 teaspoons dried chives 2 1/2 teaspoons dried paprika 1 1/2 teaspoons dried rosemary 2 1/2 teaspoons onion powder Grind all ingredients together. Meantime, check out this site:

Annie, i wasn't attempting to "pile on" or "pick a fight". I feel that lpink and the others who suggested eating plenty of fruit offered well meaning advice about general good eating habits. However, in this case, they were potentially, er, lethal ideas. In Dody's second sentence of her first post she states that her husband has high potassium. I also agree that Dody is smart enough not to take our advice. With the range of problems that her husband is facing, his diet, unfortunately, needs to be very limited and directed by his MD and RD who have full information and who can continue to monitor his potassium level. I was reading quite a bit more into what Dody said than lpink saw based on my training and the recognition of an entirely too familiar pattern. Lpink and the other fruitophiles couldn't really be expected to understand the downside to their advice, because it's not something that they would know about. I don't normally provide medical advice because I don't have enough information and because it would be improper anyway, but in this case "splurging" on fresh fruit made me cringe and reflexively say "no!" Believe it or not, I've actually seen loving, well meaning family members attempt to cure kidney problems with "juicing". Everybody knows that fruit is "healthy", right? For those of us with reasonably healthy kidneys and normal blood sugar it is! The "DASH" diet is a diet that is deliberately high in potassium. For most people it's a great diet, but not for Dody's DH, unfortunately. A lot of non-medical people may not realize that too much potassium in the blood can be life threatening. On the gardening forums someone may recommend a favorite plant and someone else may recommend against it and no hard feelings, but diet beliefs are often very personal. Here is a link that might be useful: Hyperkalemia -- The Mayo Clinic

Thank you Sue. I happy that it is something that your DH can eat. Chapatis are really easy to make too and are a wonderful addition to any meal. I've added a link to your blog on Thibeault's Table. Ann

Oops, I messed up, the oyster crackers have 40 mg of sodium... Sorry about that. Salt free salting crumbs? Never heard of them... Or could you mean the Saltine crackers without the salt on top... Those have more sodium ( 95 mg for the same amount, I think ) than the cheap oyster crackers... As for bread crumbs, well, one slice of store bought bread has 135 mg of sodium and 1 g of fat... I've done my homework... lol The highest percentage of the sodium in this recipe comes from the Phyllo sheets... I figure about 262 mg of sodium and 16 g of fat for the whole pie so 1/4 of the pie ( one serving ) would come to about 65 mg of sodium and 4 g of fat... Guess I didn't do too badly making up this recipe... Rita