I'm curious about various folks' takes on the eating of salt. I'm reading the Schwarzbein principle, and she's again' it.

Who here does not use salt? What evidence is there that it's bad for us? How the heck can you stomach meat and eggs without it? (I don't put it on fruit, veggies, or cottage cheese, but I cannot imagine an unsalted omelet...eww.)

Do people who claim they don't add salt also buy unsalted butter? Avoid cheese, olives, soy sauce and everything else salty? There are tremendous levels of salt in all those foods.

We evolved as nomads following routes out of Africa along the coasts, first of the Middle East, then Asia, eventually to the Americas...so we must have had salt all along and evolved to metabolize it.... On the other hand, if Mother Nature wanted eggs to be salty, she'd have made them salty, eh? I'm having a paleo dilemma, here.

I can't imagine a life without it. My not-overweight grandfather was told to eliminate it once...and lost 21 pounds in a month cuz food tasted so awful (which probably helped kill him, poor guy!) But does my reluctance to let it go mean that I should let it go? (My whining here sounds like addictive talk to me!)

Thoughts, links to reliable web sites or scientific references would be appreciated. Thank you all!

I gave up using extra salt in my diet when I was a teenager - this was because high blood pressure runs in the family. I've just really never developed a taste for it.

The site www.watercure2.com has some interesting information in it that you may want to look at.

For me eggs without black pepper - now that is a sin!

thanks, talon, for your quick reply!

I found one hit on medline that looks relevant to the questions I'm asking...but I'm not straight-headed enough yet this a.m. to figure out what the heck this answer is! (lol)



Frassetto L, Morris RC Jr, Sellmeyer DE, Todd K, Sebastian A. "Diet, evolution and aging--the pathophysiologic effects of the post-agricultural inversion of the potassium-to-sodium and base-to-chloride ratios in the human diet." Eur J Nutr 2001 Oct;40(5):200-13

ABSTRACT:
Theoretically, we humans should be better adapted physiologically to the diet our ancestors were exposed to during millions of years of hominid evolution than to the diet we have been eating since the agricultural revolution a mere 10,000 years ago, and since industrialization only 200 years ago. Among the many health problems resulting from this mismatch between our genetically determined nutritional requirements and our current diet, some might be a consequence in part of the deficiency of potassium alkali salts (K-base), which are amply present in the plant foods that our ancestors ate in abundance, and the exchange of those salts for sodium chloride (NaCl), which has been incorporated copiously into the contemporary diet, which at the same time is meager in K-base-rich plant foods. Deficiency of K-base in the diet increases the net systemic acid load imposed by the diet. We know that clinically-recognized chronic metabolic acidosis has deleterious effects on the body, including growth retardation in children, decreased muscle and bone mass in adults, and kidney stone formation, and that correction of acidosis can ameliorate those conditions. Is it possible that a lifetime of eating diets that deliver evolutionarily superphysiologic loads of acid to the body contribute to the decrease in bone and muscle mass, and growth hormone secretion, which occur normally with age? That is, are contemporary humans suffering from the consequences of chronic, diet-induced low-grade systemic metabolic acidosis? Our group has shown that contemporary net acid-producing diets do indeed characteristically produce a low-grade systemic metabolic acidosis in otherwise healthy adult subjects, and that the degree of acidosis increases with age, in relation to the normally occurring age-related decline in renal functional capacity. We also found that neutralization of the diet net acid load with dietary supplements of potassium bicarbonate (KHCO3) improved calcium and phosphorus balances, reduced bone resorption rates, improved nitrogen balance, and mitigated the normally occurring age-related decline in growth hormone secretion--all without restricting dietary NaCl. Moreover, we found that co-administration of an alkalinizing salt of potassium (potassium citrate) with NaCl prevented NaCl from increasing urinary calcium excretion and bone resorption, as occurred with NaCl administration alone. Earlier studies estimated dietary acid load from the amount of animal protein in the diet, inasmuch as protein metabolism yields sulfuric acid as an end-product. In cross-cultural epidemiologic studies, Abelow found that hip fracture incidence in older women correlated with animal protein intake, and they suggested a causal relation to the acid load from protein. Those studies did not consider the effect of potential sources of base in the diet. We considered that estimating the net acid load of the diet (i. e., acid minus base) would require considering also the intake of plant foods, many of which are rich sources of K-base, or more precisely base precursors, substances like organic anions that the body metabolizes to bicarbonate. In following up the findings of Abelow et al., we found that plant food intake tended to be protective against hip fracture, and that hip fracture incidence among countries correlated inversely with the ratio of plant-to-animal food intake. These findings were confirmed in a more homogeneous population of white elderly women residents of the U.S. These findings support affirmative answers to the questions we asked above. Can we provide dietary guidelines for controlling dietary net acid loads to minimize or eliminate diet-induced and age-amplified chronic low-grade metabolic acidosis and its pathophysiological sequelae. We discuss the use of algorithms to predict the diet net acid and provide nutritionists and clinicians with relatively simple and reliable methods for determining and controlling the net acid load of the diet. A more difficult question is what level of acidosis is acceptable. We argue that any level of acidosis may be unacceptable from an evolutionarily perspective, and indeed, that a low-grade metabolic alkalosis may be the optimal acid-base state for humans."

END ABSTRACT

so.... what, if any, dietary advice can I take from this? Would potassium salt mixed with real salt satisfy their requirements? As long as I'm drinking water and eating veggies, I'm fine....?

When I read your question, I was thinking that if salt was originally used as a preservative and drug, it wouldn't have much of a place in the paleo diet.

I found this link to help me figure it out, but there is a lot of reading there and I have to walk the pups!

History of Salt

Karen

I must admit I use 'salt' quite liberally - it's low sodium salt, mainly potassium, but I do use it when I 'want' it. I've found that with all the non processed foods I eat my sodium levels from food are very low, comparitively speaking (around 1500mg a day).

Going to check out both those links, ladies, thanks.

Nat

I amit I also use salt.. I use the low sodium salt mostly pottasium also.. I was always a salt aholic growing up.. but have cut back unnessary salt useage... I dont no longer hardly ever salt some of my canned vegies.. I do use on my eggs and other foods.. I do try to watch how much salt I do use as not to retain to much water..

Tammy

I do use salt. The plain ole table salt variety no less.

Depending on what I am eating, I will add salt if I feel it needs it. Normally when I use salted butter on eggs or steamed veggies I use a bit of pepper but no additional salt is needed. Other things scream add salt please. I hate bland foods

I stopped using salt some years ago back when my PMS was a sure indicator of a monthly migraine. It helped!

Until I began low carbing, I used very little cheese, only ever use the low sodium soy sauce and don't much care for olives.

I've begun eating bacon from time to time since LC and have noticed much less water retention from it now than before LC. (I love this WOE!)

And yes, I do use salted butter.

How do I stomach meat, eggs etc without salt? It just took a week or so really to retrain my taste buds, and was so long ago now that I find salted meat etc unpalatable. I really used to use enormous amounts, too. One of my doctor friends used to joke that he wanted to look after the high blood pressure that was inevitable for one such as me who used so much of the stuff!

Hope you find what you're looking for, Razzle.

Roz

I LOVE SALT! If I was stranded on a dessert island, what 3 spices would I take with me? Hehe, naw..love the stuff, always have. I have recently switched to kosher salt because I found the iodized salt had dextrose in it. So its just me and the kosher salt now. My we are a happy pair. =)

Kirsten

Haha, make that desert island, I don't want to be stuck on a DESSERT island, woahs me! Hehe. I don't think I'd get too far on this WOL if I did.

I do use salt, the regular table variety, but I don't cook with it; the exception being scrambled eggs. They don't taste as good when I put it on at the table as when I put it in when scrambling them. I got out of the habit of adding salt during cooking when I was living with an elderly lady for the summer as her live-in aide and she was on a salt restricted diet. Now I only add it at the table when I feel that it needs it.

I do use a little salt -- just regular table salt. I use it only on certain foods -- a little on meats and eggs. I do not salt veggies. I have found that since beginning this WOE and not using processed foods, certain things taste far too salty for me. For example, canned broths are too salty.

The only salt I get is whatever is in diet soda and other packaged foods. I don't care for saltiness. I don't put table salt on anything. Most chips, processed meats, etc are too salty for me.

If you really want to stop using it, here in Holland there is this salt-like stuff made from varies herbs, but on your food it tastes just like the salt!

Good luck!

Many years ago I stopped eating salt altogether (I was dating a guy whose mother wouldn't put it on the table and I was embarrased to ask for it! )

Food tasted horrible for about a week and then I couldn't eat certain things because they tasted too salty!

The only thing I just couldn't stomach without salt was eggs!! Kinda looks like many feel the same way...

Slowly over the years I have started adding salt back into my diet but not a lot, hubby was complaining that things "needed salt"!!
When I make scrambled eggs I put hot sauce on them instead of salt and as for most of the protein I eat I dont' salt it. I will use butter with salt and if I am cooking with canned broth I have a tendency to water it down (just dont' like the sodium free stuff)

You body does need a certain amount of it anyway, just keep what you add salt to to a minimum or it will cause water retention. When I was a kid I used to march in a drill team, during the summer months of parades in very hot climates, they gave out salt pills to keep us hydrated if we needed it!!!