What's cooking, good-looking?

[Angrboda]

I traded in microwave popcorn in the little bags for a microwave popcorn popper that cooks the popcorn without any oil (Nordic Ware).  I've been experimenting with different topping.  I have salt alternatives, like Morton Lite Salt (half and half), Morton Salt Substitute (potassium chloride), and Benson's Table Tasty.  I've been experimenting with lower sodium seasonings like Frank's Red Hot seasoning blend, lemon pepper, and Kernel Season's "cheesy jalapeno".  I haven't tried the lemon pepper yet.  As a salt substitute, citrus works good because it is a strong, pungent taste which can take the place of similar sensations from salt, so I'm sure the lemon pepper will come in handy on other things as well.

All a part of trying to reduce the sodium in my diet.  The challenge is that the bulk of the sodium I get comes from the specifics of the foods I eat more than it comes from putting salt or salt based spices on top.  Some things I can reduce substantially (oil-free microwave popcorn rather than potato chips), some things I can reduce a bit (lower sodium salad dressings, alternatives to soy sauce), and some things I may not reduce at all (ketchup and ramen noodles).  I think one of the keys is to eat certain foods rather than others, so, instead of eating ramen noodles or frozen pizza, I'd eat something with a lower sodium content.  I'm not there yet.  I'm not ready to give up a lot of my favorite foods, so it's difficult to make any kind of major progress.

Have you dried making low sodium alternatives for your ramen. Just throw away the ramen packs and use your own seasonings.
Maybe something like:

• 2tbs of ground ginger
  
• 1tbs of black pepper
  
• 2 tbs of garlic powder
  
• 2 tbs of onion powder
  
• 1 tsp of cardamom
  

mix it up and use to your tasting content. If you use water for your ramen and get the spices that don't have added msg or salt then you're probably going to greatly reduce your salt intake to the point where yo could sparingly just add a little table salt. If you use beef/chicked broth with your ramen (my favorite way) make sure you use a low sodium version.

Hot sauces of differing variety and pickled foods typically helped people wanting to drastically shift their salt intake that I've known. Mainly I just currently don't cook with it. It's slightly in a lot of the seasonings I already use so there's no need to salt. The only time I bust out the salt grinder is on steak night.

• powdered red pepper to taste
  

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into it. At the moment I'm trying a bunch of new flavors that I picked up the other day, but the bottom line is that I'm happy with most any flavoring if it's hot and spicy. To that end, I typically add a squirt of sriracha sauce if the ramen isn't flavorful on its own. Sriracha, oddly enough, isn't that high in sodium, and would cover for a multitude of sins. But I'll definitely give something like what you suggest a try. My ILS worker is pretty handy about knowing about spices and herbs, I'll ask her for some recommendations as well.