It’s time to talk about salt. Yep, that one thing that makes food taste so much better. But did you know it has much more purpose than just making food taste better? However, the medical system’s smear campaign on salt, which began many generations ago, has buried salt’s benefits. Today, most of us have bought the lie that salt is bad for us, but the reality is that not all salt is bad.
There’s so much to discuss with this topic, but I think the best place to start is understanding why we need salt and why it is not our enemy.
Salt is a lifeline
Recent research has started to debunk the fear of salt for good reasons. Salt has so many benefits for our bodies; without it, we would die. That’s because it is responsible for fluid balance, nerve function, muscle contraction (even the heart), adrenal function and stress response, and stomach acid production, and it does all of this through hydration. Eliminating it from your diet can definitely harm your body.
Hydration is one of the most critical aspects of our health because if we aren’t hydrated, our cells won’t work, and if those don’t work, our body essentially shuts down. Salt is loaded with something called electrolytes, and electrolytes are responsible for hydrating our bodies. We could drink a ton of water all day, but if we lack salt, we will get dehydrated on a cellular level—our bodies won’t be able to hold onto the water to function properly. So, starting every morning with salt or electrolytes like Earthley’s Electrolyte Powder will set you on the right track for hydration all day long.
But Wait! I Don’t Want High Blood Pressure!
Most people’s largest concern about salt is, “But I don’t want high blood pressure!” No one wants that, but the truth is that not all salt, and not salt alone, is responsible for causing high blood pressure. Eliminating salt gained a ton of popularity in the late 1990s after the DASH-Sodium Trial, but what this study failed to highlight is that those affected by salt in the study already had high blood pressure or were sensitive to sodium. Let’s dig a little deeper into that.
The public health campaigns during this time failed to acknowledge individual differences in salt sensitivity and didn’t consider lifestyle factors like stress, high sugar intake, processed foods, and lack of minerals like magnesium and potassium, which all affect blood pressure. All of this is related to our diets today.
Food and Minerals Matter
Our bodies require many vitamins and minerals to thrive, and they all need to be in a delicate balance for our bodies to be happy. Salt, or rather sodium, is one of those minerals our bodies need, and when it is out of balance, whether that’s low or high sodium intake, blood pressure can rise. This is because our bodies often lack potassium and magnesium to balance sodium.
When potassium and magnesium are low in the body, it can easily allow blood pressure to rise. A lack of potassium and magnesium will increase blood volume, constrict blood vessels, and raise cortisol levels. Sodium, potassium, and magnesium work in a delicate balance, and if one gets too high or too low, your whole system can get thrown out of whack. That’s why our diets are so important—these minerals are all essential to our wellbeing. Cutting out salt isn’t the answer; you need it to thrive. So, eating a diet rich in potassium and magnesium is key to finding balance.
But the problem with diet today is that we eat much differently than our ancestors in the early 20th century and prior. Conventional food today isn’t local, grass-fed, or pasture-raised, and many people eat processed foods regularly. Processed foods lack balanced minerals, and salt gets a bad reputation when talking about high blood pressure because they are made with highly refined table salt. Steering clear of processed foods and refined table salt and eating a balanced diet high in potassium and magnesium will help your body balance sodium. You might be wondering—what’s so bad about table salt? And aren’t all salts the same?
Types of Salt
What salt you use matters greatly because it impacts your overall health. Salt is put on and is in almost everything, so knowing what kind to use is important. Here’s a list of the worst salts to the best salts:
Table Salt
Table salt is honestly the worst salt you could possibly use. That’s because it is highly processed—it is stripped of all natural minerals like magnesium, potassium, calcium, and other balancing minerals, so it will skyrocket the body’s sodium. It’s also full of additives your body doesn’t need, like harmful anticaking agents, bleaching agents to make it white, and synthetic iodine that isn’t absorbed by the body well and can irritate the thyroid.
Basic Sea Salt
While sea salt is a step in the right direction, it still isn’t the answer. Basic sea salt that is cheap and white is often bleached and filled with anticaking agents, too. Though it may have some minerals in it, it still goes through a chemical process to make it white. Basic sea salt is also sourced from all over, meaning it could come from polluted parts of the ocean.
Himalayan Pink Salt
True Himalayan pink salt is an ancient sea salt rich in minerals from a salt mine in Pakistan at the base of the Himalayan Mountains. The salt mine formed from an ancient seabed that has long since completely evaporated, leaving it free of microplastics and pollutants! Sounds amazing, right? But this salt is tricky—since it is so popular, many brands that cheaply sell it cut it with fillers, so the quality is not always the best. It’s really important to look for pure Himalayan salt. And though it is high in minerals, it isn’t as bioavailable for our bodies as other salts.
Celtic Sea Salt
Celtic Sea Salt is a great choice when it comes to mineral salt. It is hand-harvested from coastal salt flats in only Brittany, France. It is unrefined, sundried, unbleached, and high in a ton of minerals (80 +), and because of this, it naturally has a lower sodium content. It is also super bioavailable for our bodies!
Redmond Real Salt
Redmond Real Salt is another great choice when looking for a high-mineral-content salt, and it is one of my favorites. It comes from an ancient, dried-up seabed in Redmond, Utah. Because it’s buried underground and has never been a part of today’s ocean, it’s naturally protected from environmental pollution and free from microplastics! It’s super bioavailable, rich in 60+ trace minerals, and has a lower sodium content than table salt.
Salt is not the enemy. It is crucial for maintaining fluid balance, nerve function, muscle contraction, and overall hydration. The key is choosing the right salt type and maintaining a balanced diet rich in potassium and magnesium. You can support your body’s needs without the fear of high blood pressure by steering clear of highly processed table salt and opting for mineral-rich options like Celtic Sea Salt or Redmond Real Salt. Remember, hydration and mineral balance are fundamental to your well-being, and incorporating the right kind of salt into your diet can make a significant difference. So, embrace the benefits of natural salts and nourish your body with the minerals it needs to thrive.
How do you incorporate salt into your daily routine?
The KEY thing with Americans getting too much salt is processed foods. I know you don’t eat them, but avoiding processed foods (soups are pure salt, as are most restaurant meals, frozen meals, salad dressings, condiments, jarred sauces, canned tomato products, etc) is the only way this statement works: “It is impossible to give a daily recommendation. Instead, salt your food to taste with high-quality sea salt, and you will do just fine.”
Where do you recommend we purchase good quality salt? I have bought pink salt and black salt at the North Market but it seems a little expensive for everyday salt. http://www.northmarket.com/meet-the-market/merchants/north-market-spices
Hi Rebecca, there are pretty good prices at both Whole Foods and Raisin Rack, in the bulk sections. Whole Foods and the Real Salt brand is the cheapest, around $2/lb.
I use pink Himalayan salt as well (I hate to point it out Kate but I’m sure that it is not sea salt, isn’t it from hills??). Switching from table salt to himalayan salt was one of the first changes I made. My poor husband nearly fell over when I told him how much it cost but by golly does that salt last & last & it tastes really good too.
I think you might want to look up the ‘additives’ in normal table salt – most are minerals that you’ll find trace elements of in your food, and calcium phosphate is the primary source of calcium in cow’s milk (which I know you drink). I just looked up all these ‘additives’ and their relation to salt, and I haven’t been able to find one which comprises more than 0.04% of the volume. And I can’t find any peer-reviewed sources that indicate that sea salt is healthier than regular salt.
You’re right that thyroid problems are on the rise because of obesity (and excessive salt consumption is usually a byproduct of obesity), but it’s my understanding that iodized salt has been used since 1924 more to reduce the incidence of goiter than to reduce thyroid problems – and it’s done its job there.
I would like it if your blog pieces had more links to studies/data. The Mayo Clinic, for example, says that there is no nutritional advantage to sea salt – I’d love to see some studies which challenge this assertion.
It is also good to note that none of the salts that you listed have iodine in them to speak of. When I stopped eating iodized salt, for all of the same reasosns that you have listed, I began to get ovarian cysts. I had no idea that getting sufficient iodine and the development of ovarian cysts were related. I went on a supplement with iodine in it and I haven’t had a problem since.
Himalayan Sea Salt is from the Himalayas, which were once at the bottom of the ocean. Therefore it can properly be called sea salt, although it is now at very high elevations due to the geological process of continental drift/collision. It is one of the purer salts, but too expensive for us, so we use Real Salt, mined in Utah. We don’t use Celtic Salt, because it is from present day ocean deposits, and our oceans are now so polluted that using Celtic gives me pause. Real Salt was the one we decided on.
Catherine – you raise an interesting question about the possible presence of pollutants (say that three times fast!) in Sea Salt. My husband loves that grayish “fleur de sel” (fancy evaporated sea salt) and I never thought about ocean pollutants. Does anyone know anything about this? Would the amount be so minimal as to be negligible?
@Sarah, peer-reviewed studies have gotten a bad rap because of the ghost writing scandal and I no longer trust peer-reviewed studies. If you need iodine, take an iodine supplement; I do that because I won’t use table salt with its chemical load. Use a good, colorful sea salt; sea water has a mineral content that pretty much matches the mineral content in our blood stream, and trace minerals are more important than most are aware of; use real sea salt (not white sea salt!) and take a good iodine supplement; one of the best is Iodoral, but you can get cheaper ones; we shop at iherb.com and Vitacost and Swanson Vitamins. An iodine supplement will also provide some protection from the halides that are damaging and are in our environment.
Catherine — You’re right about peer-reviewed studies. It makes it hard to search for good evidence because it’s hard to know what source to trust! The peer-reviewed studies are corrupt in many cases and if you really read through some of them, they’re poorly designed (basically designed to get the result they were hoping for), or the results are skewed because data was eliminated, or they didn’t use a true placebo, or…. Well, a lot of reasons! I ought to write a post on that someday…. But then you’re left with the general internet. I tend to read sites by alternative yet qualified health professionals and if I see a consensus emerge among many with different viewpoints, I go with that.
I agree that peer-reviewed studies are not infallible – there are shortcut-takers, biased researchers, and questionable methodologies in clinical research as in all professions.
I also agree with Kate that it’s important to gather information from a variety of credible sources, examine the raw data for yourself, and then come to a conclusion.
However, when it comes to ‘credible sources’, I’m more inclined to believe accredited scientists and health professionals who have conducted actual research on a wider population than I am to believe someone whose sample size consists of his/her immediate family and friends. I know, for example, that I don’t have the chemistry and biology expertise to assess, say, the effects of iodized salt on a wider population over a generational period.
I do find Google Scholar ) to be a good source of information.
@Catherine: You mention that the ‘trace minerals’ in sea salt are important. However, Kate has indicated that the trace minerals in regular salt (magnesium carbonate, calcium silicate, calcium phosphate, magnesium silicate, or calcium carbonate) are not good. Can you tell me how the trace minerals in sea salt are different from the trace minerals in regular salt? I can’t find any sources that break down the difference.
Great article, Kate! I’m passing it along to a friend who was wondering this information just a few days ago. 🙂 And we use REAL SALT now….I can tell a huge difference. It’s awesome.
Great article. Thank you for writing it. We’ve been using REAL SALT for more than 20 years now. It has a wonderful flavor, and we seem to use less of it than regular table salt.
LOVE Himalayan salt! It has replaced iodized manufactured crap in my home. Thanks 🙂
[…] Is Salt Good or Bad? […]
[…] A kitchen wouldn’t be complete without sea salt! Get some high-quality salt, like Real Salt (which I use exclusively in my kitchen…and no, they are not paying me to say that). Sea salt adds both trace nutrients and a lot of flavor to food, making all of the other flavors “pop.” Contrary to popular belief, real sea salt (but not heavily processed table salt) is actually good for you! […]
[…] warm butter and honey mixture over your popcorn. If you’d like, go ahead and sprinkle some Real Salt over it after your pour on the honey butter. Serve immediately as it is best […]