I’ve been reading Real
Food, by Nina Planck. Several
things in this book have surprised me, but none more than the fact that table
salt is a highly processed food. Yep, it is.
Planck says, “Typical
commercial salt…is an industrial leftover.” After mining salt, the chemical
industry heats it to extremely high temperatures to remove the valuable
minerals from it. These minerals – some of them essential to human health – are
sold separately to industries for a tidy sum. After harvesting the minerals,
the leftover sodium chloride is supplemented with inorganic iodine, chemicals
to prevent clumping, and dextrose. Then it is bleached. Finally it goes into a
round package with a nifty little pour spout on top.
Who would have thought to
look at the ingredients label on a box of salt? I knew that chefs recommend sea salt, but always assumed that was a culinary pretension. Now it's obvious to me that the chefs have read the label.
Unrefined sea salt, as opposed to processed salt, is rich in both essential minerals and trace minerals and contains less sodium chloride than processed salt. This mixture of minerals
makes unrefined sea salt not only more healthful than processed salt but also
more flavorful.
Unrefined sea salt may be
grey, brown, yellow, or white. I’m especially fond of Himalayan sea salt, which
is pink due to its iron content. It also contains magnesium, calcium and
potassium, and as many as 64 trace minerals. It is only 85% sodium chloride.
Unrefined sea salt costs
more than processed salt, it’s true. But it is a whole food, not an industrial
leftover, and that makes it worth the price.
Copyright
2014 by Shirley Domer
1 comment:
You are convincing me, along with other writers, so that soon, I, too, like the Europeans will be spending 30% of my income on food. Imagine that, airplane trips, fewer cars, electronic devices and more on the basics. Thanks for the post.
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