While it’s quite true that symptoms resulting from excessive salt intake include high blood pressure and heart problems, the problem lies more in the process of refining the salt itself than in the amount you eat. Like sugar and white flour, table salt has been highly processed, stripped of the vital minerals that were once in its original form.
And don’t think that just by avoiding adding table salt to your food you have eliminated it from your diet. Refined salt is usually found in processed foods in large amounts, as it is an inexpensive way to make food taste better.
In addition to having gone through a chlorination (bleaching) process, table salt contains hygroscopic (water-absorbing) additives to prevent the salt from clumping. Free flowing bright white salt always has additives.
There is a salt that is really good for your health: seawater salt, natural and unrefined. Sea salt comes to you directly from the sea. It may have a gray color indicating the presence of many other minerals. We need the vital electrolytes of salt (sodium and potassium) to control water levels in the blood and tissues.
A healthy intake of this highly nutritious sea salt will also help balance blood sugar levels; helps with the absorption of food in our intestines; act as a strong, natural antihistamine; and cleanses the lungs of mucus and phlegm. Natural sea salt brings out the natural flavor components of foods and makes food taste better than ordinary table salt.
You can find sea salt quite easily these days, at Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s, and even in some mainstream supermarkets. Look for the coarser grain, and remember that the gray color indicates less processing and more natural minerals that will benefit your overall health. Google celtic sea salt and himalayan sea salt to learn more about the health-enhancing properties of natural sea salt.