Salt, the Stuff of Life
Written by Asinus Asinum Fricat on May 14, 2008 – 8:12 am - 
Salt, the most popular food seasoning, is a dietary mineral essential for animal life, composed primarily of sodium chloride. Salt for human consumption is produced in different forms: unrefined salt (such as sea salt), refined salt (table salt), and iodized salt. It is a crystalline solid, white, pale pink or light grey in color, normally obtained from sea water or rock deposits. Edible rock salts may be slightly greyish in color due to this mineral content.
Chloride and sodium ions, the two major components of salt, are necessary for the survival of all known living creatures, including humans. Salt is involved in regulating the water content (fluid balance) of the body. Salt flavor is one of the basic tastes. Salt cravings may be caused by trace mineral deficiencies as well as by a deficiency of sodium chloride itself.
Overconsumption of salt increases the risk of health problems, including high blood pressure. In food preparation, salt is used as a preservative and as a seasoning.
Salt is not just a happy condiment, it is an essential life ingredient, and the primary means of preserving both food and drink before refrigeration. To the Romans it was one more good reason to invade Gaul. In the sixteenth century the insidious salt tax extended to the western parts of France, causing active revolts. According to French food historian Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat, the rabble of Bordeaux evidently grabbed the bureaucrat who administered the tax, cut him up, and salted his parts, much as they would have ministered to a fattened pig. And by the time of the Revolution, the then centuries-old salt tax, mixed with famine after a poor grain harvest, was a further incitement to overthrow the aristocracy, who, naturally paid no salt tax.
Salt, too, I discovered not only has color - gray salt is the most reminiscent of the sea - but also perfume. Experts can apparently sniff out the difference among salt from mines, salt of the sea, sea salt skimmed first from the surface of the flats, and salt from below, slow to appear after evaporation. My nose for salt is sadly undeveloped, though a faintly brackish, slightly geranium-leaved aromatic scent did begin to take vague olfactory shape.
Tags: Condiment, History, Salt, Spice
Posted in Food |
The sea salt I use is only slightly offwhite and has no mineral flavor that I can detect. I’m not sure I would like the heavily mineralized ones.
Until I discovered sea salt, I used kosher salt for cooking and table seasoning. I can’t stand the iodized table salt that most people like — it tastes only of chemicals to me. But since my husband is very, very concerned about lack of iodine, he insists on the iodized table variety. Like everything else in our house (toothpaste, shampoo, etc), we have to have separate salt shakers!
You lead a complicated life, kate!
If you only knew. LOL
I’m fanatic about iodized salt as well, even though I live right next to a fresh Atlantic breeze every day. This is because I lived in Eastern Europe in April 1986 when that little nuclear plant in Belarus blew up.. My father had always insisted on the iodized salt variety since the 1970’s (when they built a nuclear power plant about a mile from our house) and I reckon it is because of this that our thyroid glands didn’t need to absorb the radioactive iodine isotope which has created so much misery for people in that area in the form of cancers and birth defects. The true figure of human casualties from the Chernobyl disaster will never be known, and my father himself died a very young man (he was 39) from a very aggressive form of lung cancer not long after.
I feed my family only iodized salt. Small thing, but you never know. When I remember that beautiful spring rain in 1986, and us walking around in it- before anyone ever told us of its deadly cargo, still makes my blood run cold.
Keep up the saltinization of our house!
I may have invented a word, LOL!
I discovered kosher salt many years ago, when I mistakenly picked up a box of it, thinking it was regular salt, and I have used it exclusively ever since.
What I like about kosher salt is that it seems to be “saltier” than finer-ground salt; I end up using less of it for the taste I want.
For six months many years ago, I had to go on a low-salt diet. I was not to have more than 2000 mg. sodium/day - and considering that a teaspoon of salt contains 2400 mg. of sodium, that ain’t much salt. During this time, I discovered how much hidden salt there is in foods, and I spent literally hours in the grocery store, reading labels to figure out what I could and could not eat.
Lemon juice and pepper became my good friends, and Mrs. Dash and I collaborated on how to season foods so I did not have to salt them.
Certain foods, like tomatoes, seem to just cry for salt. I could not find a suitable substitute for seasoning tomatoes.
I have learned a lot about salt and how not to use much of it - but to use it to its best advantage when nothing else will do!
I too am on a low-sodium diet, and mine is supposed to stay under 1500 mg. I don’t think I’ve ever managed that, but I can consistently keep it around 2000-2400. I agree about the kosher salt being “saltier,” and I’ve found that sea salt tastes even saltier than kosher — possibly because of the naturally-occurring potassium chloride.
I buy lemons three and four dozen at a time.
For normal, day to day table use, I use an iodized major brand since the iodine content of the water is not that high here.
For canning, I use Morton Canning and Pickling salt because of its high purity. Iodine and anticaking agents in regular salt affect the color and texture of canned goods adversely, so I prefer this product for those purposes.
An interesting tidbit is that Latin word for salt is “salus”, and that the Roman soldiers were paid monthly in part with salt. Hence our modern English word, “salary”. Warmest regards, Doc.
And we still use the word salut, which means hello!
Salut!
There is a wonderful Hawaiian volcanic salt that is a coral color. It does look sort of like kosher salt but it tastes like minerals, the sea and orchids!
Look up! I put a pic of your salt up!
Thanks, it’s a beautiful pic!
I’ve never tasted this salt, it looks yummy!
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