[Kevin]
Hello, Michelle, how are you?

[Michelle]
Hello, Kevin. It's been a while. I feel like it was forever since we did that last episode.

[Kevin]
Exactly. Well, it's only been two weeks as far as the listeners care. So let's not ruin the magic.

[Michelle]
Two weeks without you is like it's like a deficiency of its own.

[Kevin]
Oh, so today you have got, I believe, a listener question. Is that right?

[Michelle]
Yeah, I had a lot of questions. Yeah, me too. I had a listener ask if we could talk about salt.

What's the deal with salt? OK, so it wasn't actually any more specific than that. But I was like, well, there's lots of things to talk about with salt.

Yeah. So take this with a grain of salt.

[Kevin]
I think we just got our podcast title for this week. Oh, dear God. Yeah.

Don't don't let me lose.

[Michelle]
Anyway, so it's really interesting, right? Because we know that we are hardwired as humans to the taste of sugar, salt and fat. And like our brains light up when we have those things.

And that's what we have too much of, which is why we tend to consume foods that are over seasoned with those things. Or or we we we add, we, you know, generously added ourselves. Have you ever watched Gordon Ramsey cooking shows?

Like occasionally he says, but he's oh, my gosh, I love him so much. Anyway, he's often he's often chastising either that they've under seasoned or over seasoned. But the over seasoning is is always with salt.

It's not with the other seasonings, right? Yes. Or where that's the only seasoning that they actually really use because they're just not like some of them just aren't experienced enough.

And there's, you know, in the in different sort of nutrition circles, they actually refer to sugar, oil and salt as S.O.S. foods because oil being like usually the most egregious of the of the fats and the sources of saturated fats. Anyway, so we're going to talk about salt and salt and sodium. We use those terms interchangeably.

Right. I know I do.

[Kevin]
Of course.

[Michelle]
Yeah, but they are. In fact, you know, they don't mean the same thing. So so table salt.

You do remember from school, from chemistry, what the chemical name is?

[Kevin]
L2, which is sodium chloride, sodium chloride. Right.

[Michelle]
So sodium chloride is a crystallite compound. It's abundant in nature. And salt is sodium chloride, which is table salt.

So sodium chloride is 40 percent sodium and 60 percent chloride. And it's the sodium part that gets us into trouble.

[Kevin]
OK, so just to give you chlorine is delicious to eat.

[Michelle]
Oh, yeah.

[Kevin]
I always drink pool water when I can, you know, sinks into the palate.

[Michelle]
Yeah.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Hmm.

[Michelle]
Anyway, so one teaspoon of table salt, which is about six thousand milligrams, give or take, contains about twenty four hundred grams of sodium.

[Kevin]
OK.

[Michelle]
Right. So and then just so that everyone's clear when we're talking about sodium, we're talking about a mineral. So it is a mineral.

It's also an electrolyte type of mineral. So we we need to have salt. But the bottom line is that we get way too much.

[Kevin]
Yes.

[Michelle]
So what's bad about that? So what's bad about having too much salt is it can be lead to high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke. It can also displace calcium so it can contribute to calcium loss, because some of which may get actually pulled right out of the bone.

Oh, wow. And the we use it in foods to season, as I said, but in in packaged and processed foods. So processed and ultra processed foods is really where in the North American standard diet that we get way too much.

It's it's a very common stabilizer. It's a binder. It's a food preservative because and this is why, like in the old days, they used to use like rock salt and things like that, because bacteria cannot thrive in the presence of high amounts of salt.

Right.

[Kevin]
On ships. When when when the English and other other, you know, the Portuguese were crossing the Atlantic, they had salted pork and salted cod and other and salt beef. And they just have because it's stable at room temperature.

[Michelle]
Yeah, exactly. Which sounds absolutely disgusting.

[Kevin]
But yeah, but you have to you have to wash it off well before you eat it. But yeah, it's it's a great preservative.

[Michelle]
Yeah. So but but don't get me wrong. We like the human body needs some salt.

So we need a healthy amount of salt because we need like the like that electrolyte balance for nerve impulses, for our muscles to contract and relax. And it's also essential, like in the right amount, in the balancing water and minerals in our body. Right.

So so it's made up of both sodium and chloride, and both sodium and chloride are electrolytes. And so that helps just generally with those those nerve type things. But they conduct electrical charges.

So they're conductors and they help us maintain our fluid and our blood volume. So you remember back in the water episode we talked about, you know, up to a gallon, but not more than a gallon of water for the average person.

[Kevin]
Yeah.

[Michelle]
Right. And the danger when you can have too much water is that you will actually you will actually dilute like you will you will dilute the electrolytes.

[Kevin]
Right. OK.

[Michelle]
And and that can that can quite quite put you at risk.

[Kevin]
So you don't have enough salt in that case or the salt is too diluted to do its job.

[Michelle]
Can be. But, you know, in North America, we're not very much in danger of this with the salt we ingest.

[Kevin]
Of course. Of course.

[Michelle]
So let's just let's just start with how much we need. OK, so we need about 500 milligrams of sodium per day just to carry out normal functions, that nerve signaling, that electrolyte balance, that that all of the balance of blood and and and fluids, all of that stuff, blood volume. Right.

But our Health Canada recommendation, and this is pretty on par with other countries in the world, it varies a little bit. They the recommendation is no more than a teaspoon of salt, which I said is approximately, you know, six grams or 6000 milligrams. OK, which translates to no more than 2300 milligrams of sodium per day.

And that's pretty, pretty close. World Health Organization recommends a bit less. So the WHO would say less than 5000 milligrams of salt per day, which translates to less than 2000 milligrams of sodium.

So less.

[Kevin]
OK.

[Michelle]
Less than a teaspoon.

[Kevin]
But in the same ballpark.

[Michelle]
In the same ballpark. That kind of characterizes what the recommendations are, the RDA. And keep in mind, when we talk about RDA or recommended dietary allowances, those are not considered optimal.

Those are RDAs are the amount that they recommend in order to avoid disease.

[Kevin]
OK, the sort of the bare minimum.

[Michelle]
They don't really. Well, the bare minimum or bare maximum.

[Kevin]
Or bare maximum. Right, right.

[Michelle]
So they right. So they well, there's an upper there's an upper tolerable limit, but there is no upper tolerable limit for salt. So it's really it's really about that recommended daily allowance.

Like turn not more than not more than a teaspoon.

[Kevin]
Right.

[Michelle]
But but that doesn't necessarily mean that's for best health. Right. So if we kind of go back to the first thing that I said there, what we actually need to carry out our daily functions.

Was that. 500 milligrams of sodium daily.

[Kevin]
OK.

[Michelle]
Right. OK. But the global average for sodium intake is estimated to be four thousand three hundred and ten milligrams per day.

[Kevin]
So more or less double what who and Canada and most like most of the recommendations are double. Yeah.

[Michelle]
And because globally there is far too much sodium, far too much salt, far too much sodium. Right. They think that that contributes to almost two million deaths per year.

[Kevin]
Well, from heart disease and stroke.

[Michelle]
Yeah. High blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, all those things. Wow.

So, yeah. So the. We talked about the RDA being sort of to avoid harm.

[Kevin]
Right.

[Michelle]
Not necessarily being optimal. So I looked up what the Institute of Medicine suggested. So the IOM, they suggest aiming for fifteen hundred milligrams per day.

So well below a teaspoon of salt.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Yeah. So we've got.

I mean, 25 percent less than the RDA.

[Michelle]
Yeah. So we're doing about double. They said and of the of the RDA, IOM Institute of Medicine suggests.

Less than that. We've got lots of room to do better. That's for sure.

[Kevin]
Yeah. It seems it sounds like we're about 65 percent over what the Institute of Medicine is recommending.

[Michelle]
Yeah. Yeah.

[Kevin]
So way over our basic bodily function of 500 milligrams.

[Michelle]
Right. And and then, you know, we've talked about this before. Your taste buds get adapted for sugar, salt and fat.

And then everything starts to taste bland when you cut the salt out of your diet because and then you think, oh, I don't like that food is tasteless. And it takes a little bit for those microbiome, you know, those those microbes to convert and for your taste buds to adapt. But eventually it does.

I mean, I probably one of those people that ate far too much salt and the rest of the world, it sounds like. Well, because the majority of North Americans, it's because of all of the ultra processed foods and the packaged and processed foods. And I think you and I are both of that generation where we just saw those added to the market incrementally our whole lives.

Right. And now it's like the mainstay of the grocery stores and and restaurants. Like there were not all of these fast food restaurants and and like the mall.

I'm trying to remember. I think the mall had like two places to eat.

[Kevin]
Yeah, yeah. No, but but but I want to say also just, you know, my my personal pet peeve is it's not just the fast food restaurants. I'm finding more and more even like, you know, upscale restaurants.

Yeah. Salting their food to the point that I get home and I don't sleep well because I'm so thirsty. Right.

And I feel that I need to drink a lot. And then, you know, the opposite happens. I'm trying to sleep after drinking so much.

So I just I don't sleep well because I've ingested way too much salt. And that's after, you know, obviously I expect that if I go to, you know, any of the burger joints or whatever. But if I go to a nice place, I would expect it to be better seasoned and not just over salted.

[Michelle]
Yeah. And it's not just the salt. There's salty taste in MSG, monosodium glutamate.

And it's often added as a flavor enhancer and a preservative. Sodium nitrate is in there as a preservative. Making soda is everything.

Yeah. Like so there's so many different sources. And it's it's for the shelf life and the distribution of these often these, you know, restaurant supply products.

[Kevin]
Right. It's in bulk. But there are options, because, for instance, like I in the last two or three years, maybe I'm buying when I buy canned beans or, you know, chickpeas or something, there's always one brand that has a salt free, like no added salt, which I always buy.

And there's always one brand of tomato sauce or something or canned tomatoes. And I tend to try to buy those just because I'm aware that there's salt in everything else. So I'm trying to reduce it where I possibly can.

[Michelle]
Yeah. And I think that's a great tip, because like you, you do have to actively look for those low sodium or sodium free can because, you know, getting getting some things canned and stocking your pantry is a really reasonable thing to do. But you have to watch out for even I even have to watch out for it all the time.

I actually grabbed some stuff here that were that was in our pantry because I you know, I'm looking at nutrition labels most of the time, but I don't do all the grocery shopping either. Oh, but, you know, well, you know, what is a great job he does. But but sometimes and then sometimes, too, it's like I want something and specifically like like a look for this and he gets what he can find.

And like I said, I've always said I'm the nutritionist that lives in the real world. You know, I do 98 percent of the strokes, right? And therefore I don't get too fussed about the other way.

But they're very common traps, right? Especially if you're shopping based on price and you're not always turning the label over. So soups, canned.

Soups are often a trap. And what do I have here? This one is a organic coconut curry sweet potato, which I'm sure ended up stocked in our pantry, probably as a contingency type of food.

Sure.

[Kevin]
Yeah.

[Michelle]
Our grocery shopper tends to do that.

[Kevin]
It's not a bad idea. I'll defend him.

[Michelle]
One cup, one one cup of this soup prepared has five hundred and eighty milligrams of salt.

[Kevin]
Well, there's your daily like requirement to stay alive. Well, I don't. Wow, that's huge.

[Michelle]
And you don't even usually have just one cup.

[Kevin]
Would you make a bowl of soup? Might have more. Yeah.

Wow.

[Michelle]
So that would be that would be half of almost half of your daily more than half of your daily requirement, just having a bowl of soup.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Wow.

[Michelle]
And then I've got another one that's also organic. And this one's local. And then it's, you know, a place that we think of as having healthy stuff.

[Kevin]
Yeah.

[Michelle]
It also has five hundred and seventy milligrams of sodium per one or two hundred and fifty mils per cup.

[Kevin]
Wow.

[Michelle]
Crazy, right? And what do I have here? Here is another one that's not in a can.

It's in one of those one of those packs, the tetrapaki thingies. And it's also organic, non-GMO, has all of those lovely labels on it. And it has five hundred and ten milligrams of sodium per cup.

Wow. So this seems to be a very common salt level, probably to preserve it in these formats. Right.

[Kevin]
Well, I wonder if also to to your point earlier, I wonder if part of it is also if one soup has five hundred milligrams per serving per cup, then that becomes the consumer expectation. So maybe other soups kind of look at the competition and say, yeah, maybe we need to do this. I don't know.

I'm wondering like peer pressure. It's it's super pressure.

[Michelle]
And I think I think the point is, like, it's really reasonable to stock your pantry with some of these things, because it's good to have some of these rainy day foods or, you know, I was running late. We didn't get, you know, let's just make some soup.

[Kevin]
A hundred percent.

[Michelle]
But it shouldn't be the default. And honestly, if you have. A blender or a slow cooker or even just a pot, like it's actually quite easy to make soup like it or yeah, or I mean,

[Kevin]
I will just say, you know, if because again, I'm a I'm a big fan of the emergency food and have something, but just look at the label and be and and, you know, try to find something that's made, you know, be aware if it's a 500 milligram, maybe you can find something

[Michelle]
that's a little bit less or otherwise you look at the ingredients of these soups and they look really good. Like there there's no there's no other additives and preservatives.

They're all organic. There's you know, it's all spices and whatnot. But you know, the downfall is that sodium content.

Right. And I can honestly say before preparing for this episode, I don't know. I don't know that my eyes went there either.

[Kevin]
Yeah. And it's not necessarily a an obvious ingredient. I feel that salt is sometimes a bit like sugar in that I find ingredients.

They sometimes, you know, they rarely say sugar or, you know, then they'll add glucose or fructose or something like, you know, a rose by any other name. And I feel that salt's another one. You'd mentioned a few sodium blah, blah, blah's earlier on in the podcast, in the episode, and they use it by different names.

So looking at the ingredients, you might not necessarily say, maybe, oh, look at the salt. It's like if I saw something where salt is the third ingredient, obviously I'd never touch it unless it was salt. But, you know, if they've got five or six ingredients all low down that are all providing the same salt content, it's it's tough to actually figure out.

In the long run, how good or bad it is like it's it's a bit misleading, I find.

[Michelle]
Yeah. Now I've got two other ones here. These are not soups.

These are so full disclosure. These are salad dressings that are plant based salad dressings that are in my fridge. So this is a vinaigrette based plant powered ranch dressing.

OK, because my daughter loves her ranch dressing. And this is per. So the nutrition facts serving of salad dressing is two tablespoons, which is not very much.

If somebody has a big bowl, I rarely see people use that little. Yeah, it has one hundred and ninety milligrams of sodium in two tablespoons. And now this one, I was expecting this one to be more because it's a miso vinaigrette dressing.

[Kevin]
OK, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Michelle]
Right. So I was expecting it to be saltier. And, you know, again, I'm going to say the labels on these are actually pretty good because they you know, they highlight, you know, the first ingredient is water and soy sauce and miso paste.

And there's there's some sugar, but it's for like it's a they call it out as agave and it's further down the list and et cetera. But and they say this one says that there is salt in the soy sauce. The other one said it was sea salt that they added.

OK, but this miso dressing per two tablespoons is two hundred and twenty milligrams of sodium.

[Kevin]
Oh, wow.

[Michelle]
And that's that's just what you're putting on top of your salad.

[Kevin]
That's not having a meal or. Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's just the condiment.

[Michelle]
And then the big whammy that I opened up the fridge to see what's in there.

[Kevin]
No whammies, no whammies.

[Michelle]
Oh, well, you know what? Somebody wanted a teriyaki stir fry. So I, you know, was making my stir fry and I said to Rob, you know, pick up some teriyaki sauce and he got whatever.

And it's a very common brand. There's nothing healthy about this, but it was teriyaki sauce, which is what I asked for. I just about choked when I looked at the label of this.

I want you to guess.

[Kevin]
Oh, I'm scared. What's the serving size?

[Michelle]
Well, it's not it's actually not as bad as the soup. It's one quarter cup, which is pretty reasonable if you're going to put you're going to see some stir fry. Four hundred and twenty milligrams of sodium.

So I was just thinking about that, like, you know, I go to all this trouble to cook really carefully to not add all those things to it, you know, make sure. And then, you know, I went and dumped like probably a condiment on 500 milligrams of teriyaki sauce on it.

[Kevin]
Right. Right. It's funny because because I found so so we do some of those meal delivery services.

[Michelle]
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Hello, fresh or something like that.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Yeah. I get I'm trying not to, you know, use it, but I actually switch between two of them just because I find I don't always like their their menus.

So I alternate every other week. They, I find. Really, really over salt there, and they always have little packages of of seasoning based on, you know, whatever it is.

And I find I use maybe a quarter of it. Yeah, because there are times there are a few times when I made it. And it was literally, literally inedible.

It was like the meal ended up being so salty. It's not like they accidentally added a second. Like I look back at the menu saying, oh, like, was I only supposed to use half of this?

Like, did they send the wrong amount? And like, no, I use the amount that they said I should use. And I couldn't like no one in the household.

We ended up ordering pizza or something because it was which would have been salty. But it was inedible because it was so salty. So now I'm hyper aware of those.

Now use maybe a quarter of the seasoning. And that surprises me also that it's supposed to be somewhat homemade.

[Michelle]
And I know it's prepackaged and all that, but well, they're obviously catering to their base and they've probably done some market testing, some product testing. And they you know, they're making it optional, at least for you to add.

[Kevin]
Yeah, exactly. I can add less, but they should almost warn you. Like they always have a warning for the the spiciness level.

But they also warn you, like if you don't if you're on a low sodium diet or you just don't want salt, like use less.

[Michelle]
So I'm going to here's a couple of things that are very common that that people will go and buy when they're just out grabbing food. Yeah, the average prepared slice of restaurant pizza. Oh, I'm just just one slice on average contains nine hundred and fifty seven milligrams of sodium.

[Kevin]
Well, because you'd have salt in the crust because bread needs salt to rise. You'd have salt, probably the tomato paste or tomato sauce guaranteed because it'll be canned and industrial size. You'd have a lot of salt in the mozzarella cheese or whatever cheese is on that.

And then if you add like pepperonis or probably, you know, if you have like salt, you know, canned olives or, you know, canned mushrooms, gross. But, you know, like depending on the pizza chain, if they're using canned goods or the canned jalapeno peppers, salt, salt, salt, salt, salt, salt, like all of those have got even a little bit of salt, then we'll add up and you're piling it on top.

[Michelle]
Yeah. And a six inch submarine sandwich, just an average six inch submarine sandwich with processed meat, cheese and condiments. One thousand one hundred and twenty seven milligrams of sodium.

Oh, but that's people think that they go if they go to that, they think, oh, that's that's healthy. I'll just get a sub and I'll just get a six inch.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Well, but processed meat is like, oh, yeah.

[Michelle]
Yeah. I want to remind everyone that that processed meats are group one carcinogens. They're in the same category as asbestos and lead and cigarette smoke.

So they are incredibly cancer causing because they're not just salt.

[Kevin]
They're like nitrates as well and other things. Yeah. There's a whole lot wrong with with processed meat.

Don't do it, people. Don't do it. Don't do it.

[Michelle]
You're salty enough, Kev.

[Kevin]
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Michelle]
But here are some common things that Health Canada said that that have added sodium and often high added sodium. OK, so we talked about soup. I was surprised to see instant puddings.

Cottage cheese, things that you would think. Yeah, I wouldn't have thought.

[Kevin]
Yeah.

[Michelle]
Vegetable juices. So like your tomato juice, your clamato juice, your V8 juice, salad dressings, which we talked about cheese. Not a surprise.

Breakfast cereals are often high in sodium.

[Kevin]
Yeah, I'm going to go check my pantry as soon as we're off this podcast.

[Michelle]
So I don't think we're surprised by things like salty snacks, nuts, chips, popcorn, pretzels, bread, muffins, cookies, crackers, processed meats. No surprise. We talked about ready made dishes.

We already talked about pizza and submarines and things like that. But anything that's a frozen entree, a frozen appetizer, frozen lasagnas, frozen cabbage rolls, whatever sauces and dips are common traps. Like even me, like I like we're so super diligent in our house.

But we've got a couple of things right in there. And again, it's not to be like go over the edge and be crazy. I mean, if you if you can be that person that you can make everything from scratch and avoid those, then that's awesome.

And I certainly have times where I'm able to do that. But we're just like everyone else. We're just regular people.

We grab some salad dressing. We grab some, you know, ready made sauces and dips. And I just think that's real.

But even things like your ketchup has a surprising amount of salt and sugar in it. I think all condiments are Worcester sauce, mayonnaise, dips, barbecue sauce, etc. Right.

[Kevin]
I think it comes down to being aware, because I find one thing that I do is when I cook. On very rare occasions, I never add salt.

[Kevin]
when I'm cooking simply because I know that there's bound to be, unless I know 100%, it's like fresh tomatoes in summer and it's a gazpacho and everything's completely fresh and nothing canned or no condiments, except for that rare case, I pretty much know that there's going to be something salty, some condiment I use, some canned ingredient. So I tend just not to add salt when I'm cooking because I know it's going to get there anyways, or it'll get there in some other meal that I make my breakfast cereal.

[Michelle]
Or you just use a little tiny bit, like if you want your water to boil or...

[Kevin]
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Michelle]
Right. Stuff like that. But here's the thing that I think often just gets people because we've established it's super important for us to be really conscious about our eating, conscious about our sodium intake from the salt.

And there are many, many people doing that. I we should cut down on our salt, heart disease, stroke, heart attack. It's the number one global killer of people worldwide.

So there's a lot of people consciously choosing other salts. And I am going to talk about those. But I want to talk about the little trap that can happen there if you're not careful.

So The Economist magazine actually did an article on this that a century ago, much of North America was known as the goiter belt.

[Kevin]
Okay.

[Michelle]
So, so have you ever seen pictures of goiter? It's like Google.

[Kevin]
It's, it's, it's not. Don't Google it, people. Don't.

You don't want to see that.

[Michelle]
It's super. Yeah. And it's something, you know, it used to be like really, really super common.

It used to be very, very common in this area in particular because of iodine deficiency. Like very common. So a lack of natural iodine in the soil and water in this part of the world, and then an otherwise iodine poor diet, like can lead to this enlarged thyroid gland.

So your thyroid glands, like down here at the bottom of your neck, they, they fixed this. But like when doctors would diagnose it, they, you know, they would supplement iodine with people. And then that would, in most people that would shrink the goiter or shrink, shrink the thyroid gland and the problem would go away.

And this is the reason why in 1924, iodized salt was, was rolled out and made common. So, so by 1940s goiter had pretty much all but vanished in this part of the world. But now, because, you know, changing diets, product innovations and lack of public education, and even, you know, the way that things get marketed, they say that goiter is making a comeback.

[Kevin]
Wow, what a weird thing to happen.

[Michelle]
I know, I know it is. And you know what, and think about how, how awful that would be for somebody and how stigmatizing.

[Kevin]
And then like, not to confuse, that's so simple to avoid.

[Michelle]
Right, right. And not to, not to confuse goiter that comes from like simple iodine deficiency, you know, hypothyroidism that is kind of dietary induced with people that end up having an autoimmune disease. They may have Hashimoto's thyroiditis, things like that, like, which is also, you know, can be very much dietary related.

And that's a bit more difficult to overcome. But like the common goiter that they're talking about is the one that's just simply not getting enough iodine.

[Kevin]
And we don't. I'm finding this very ironic somehow, because out of one side of our mouths, we're saying, you know, the world is eating like 4,000 milligrams of salt and we're like so over salted. And yet on the other side, we're also saying, oh, but we're having goiter issues and we're not getting enough iodine, which comes from salt.

Like it's, it's, it's kind of the worst of both worlds.

[Michelle]
Here's the thing, most of these packaged and processed foods and where we're getting all this sodium isn't iodized.

[Kevin]
That. Oh, OK. That's what I was missing.

[Michelle]
Yeah, it's not. They're not iodized. Like even even I told you, I would think I was reading this label.

It goes out. It calls out that it's got Himalayan sea salt, which is.

[Kevin]
Oh, OK.

[Michelle]
Yeah. It's a regular, ordinary, boring table salt.

[Kevin]
Right. Has is iodized and it actually calls out because I know that I have sea salt in my cupboard right now, but it specifically says iodized. And I never really understood what that was about, but I knew it was kind of good to have you from getting a goiter.

I don't want a big goiter. I got a skinny neck and I would not look good with a goiter. I'd be lopsided.

It's terrible.

[Michelle]
So the thing the funny thing is that we don't actually really need very much iodine like we need. We need very little. So let me see here.

Iodized salt contains forty five micrograms per gram of salt per thousand milligrams. But a human needs only about one hundred and fifty microgram micrograms. OK, baby, clear micrograms.

So there's forty five micrograms per gram of salt and we only need one hundred and fifty micrograms left for children.

[Kevin]
Right. So the proportions are accurate. Yeah, the proportions are accurate in that if you need, you know, you know, if the average person gets two to three thousand milligrams of salt, then they'd be a hundred.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it kind of it's proportionate.

[Michelle]
Yeah. And that's the funny thing. So we've got all of these, you know, bougie salts that and hey, I love me a good bougie salt as much as the next person.

But the irony is that these bougie salts actually, you know, unless they're iodized, you're actually maybe better off using the iodized salt and just adding seasoning.

[Kevin]
And there's actually a double layer of irony because the other thing is a lot of these bougie salts are marketed saying there are trace elements and trace minerals in our Himalayan pink salt that was harvested by virgins at midnight on every other Tuesday. Under a full moon and blah, blah, blah. And it's like all these trace elements.

But they're missing like that that core important element of iodine. That's that's that's kind of almost misleading. I don't know.

[Michelle]
So let's I'm just going to talk about some of the salts because the listener question I'm wondering when they said I want you to talk about salt. I wondered if they wanted to know some of this. So we have we have our Himalayan pink salt and like they're like and which which has it like these all have a different taste.

Right. And I think that's why why people like them, like like Himalayan pink salt is really very nice. And it it has trace other trace minerals in it.

It has some calcium, some iron, magnesium. But you know what? The thing is, when you've got these trace minerals in your salt and you're not using, you shouldn't be using very much.

It makes a difference. The trace mineral in there doesn't it may impact the taste. It won't really impact you a lot for you from a health perspective.

You're not going to get your daily requirement of magnesium from a little bit of salt, right?

[Kevin]
Yeah.

[Michelle]
There's kosher salt. There's some people that really swear by that. And kosher salt does have slightly less sodium per teaspoon only because kosher salt is much more coarse.

So like what a teaspoon of kosher salt is and would have less volume. Exactly. Exactly.

But also, you know, unless it's added no iodine. OK, like other just generic, you know, when when somebody markets is sea salt, it's not necessarily Himalayan, but sea salt again, it'll contain other trace minerals, but often not iodine unless it's added. One that's really popular that you'll see in recipes, particularly like plant based vegan recipes, is asking for Kala Namak.

So it's the pink Himalayan salt that is blackened in its processing. It's very popular, you know, kind of in those those parts of the world like where Nepal, India, whatever. But it has what special Kala Namak is.

I think it's higher in sulfur and phosphorus, like it has that eggy sort of sort of odor and taste to it. Well, it's often recommended in recipes where you're using tofu or something and you're trying to make an egg type of dish. They say to add a little bit of Kala Namak and then you get you kind of add in that that eggy taste, that eggy smell.

It's very popular in Ayurveda as well because they it's a very popular Kala Namak is popular to use as an electrolyte. And there's claims that it really supports digestion, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of evidence really supporting that. But there's a belief, there's a belief that Kala Namak is going to be better for you digestibly as well.

Now, one that we use that is not iodized, and we bought it in Hawaii because I love everything from Hawaii, Hawaiian black volcanic salt. So it's because of they have black beaches in that part of Hawaii as well. But so it's often like sometimes you can buy black salts like black, like it's just called black salt and it's not actually black naturally.

It's because they start with a Himalayan pink salt and then they use a charcoal kind of process with seasons or whatever to blacken the salt. But this is actual volcanic black salt. And again, it's not iodized, but it has a different taste, right?

So these all have a different taste. And if it's the taste that you're after, that's great. But you, and if you're not going to, if you're going to choose to use these salts and choose to not use iodized salt, then you're going to have to think about your iodine from another source just to make sure you're getting, you know, daily, like your regular requirements.

And you can do that with sea vegetables, like adding some, some nori, some kelp, wakame seaweed, or whatever too. I often, particularly when my, my kids were younger and it was easier for me to hide things in their food, I would like, I would like make a big stew or a chili or something like that. And I, and I would hide some seaweed in there.

[Kevin]
Okay.

[Michelle]
Or like, or like even those sheets are a popular snack.

[Kevin]
They're very, very salty.

[Michelle]
Yeah. You know what I mean? Those nori sheets.

[Kevin]
My son loves those.

[Michelle]
Yeah. They're very, very, very tasty. In nutrition school, one, a salt substitute that was really popular is, I am going to mention a brand because you're the only ones that know that do it.

As far as I know, it's called Herb-O-Mare, but I've noticed now there's all different types of Herb-O-Mare because the Herb-O-Mare that we were having was a sodium free herb kind of blend that you use as a salt substitute. But now there's Herb-O-Mare sea salt that has a third less salt than other salts. And there's, then there isn't actually this one, there's a really good video by Dr. Michael Greger, nutritionfacts.org about this, and he does these nutrition videos and they're awesome and they're short. But he said like one common thing that people can do is switch to potassium chloride instead of sodium chloride. And it also has a bit of a salty taste to it. And there's an Herb-O-Mare potassium chloride version.

And then, you know, people can, you know, just use other spices, like use a bit of table salt or whatever, but be generous on the use of other spices and herbs and things like that to enhance your food or add nuts to your dishes. Add a little tiny bit of maybe maple syrup to something or, you know, small amounts of dried fruits, things like that to adjust flavors to things without using salt as the only option.

[Kevin]
Right. No, exactly. It builds a much broader flavor profile besides just salt.

And it also gives you much more variety because if you cook two different meals, you can add completely different spice profiles and it doesn't just taste like salt.

[Michelle]
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You know, there's one other thing I found out that's worth mentioning, [Kevin]
.

I found this really interesting problem that there was a point in time where some people were getting too much iodine. And it was because of the, back in the 1950s and 60s, apparently in this part of the world, the dairy industry used to use an iodine-based disinfectant and iodine-based conditioners were also added to commercial baking products. And then that put many, many people on track.

So it's really funny, right? Like food innovation happens and then they're solving one problem, but they create another problem.

[Kevin]
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Michelle]
That's crazy. But that situation, thankfully, has stabled.

[Kevin]
Good, good. Okay. So now we just have to worry about too little iodine, not too much.

[Michelle]
Well, we shouldn't be drinking dairy anyway. We've already established that.

[Kevin]
Exactly.

[Michelle]
It's really super important that I want to emphasize this. It's one of the reasons why pregnant women and nursing women are often encouraged to make sure that you're taking your prenatal vitamins and check to make sure that your prenatal vitamin or your pregnancy vitamin actually has iodine in it. Because iodine is super important.

It's important to make thyroid hormone, but during fetal development and infancy and childhood, thyroid hormone is essential for proper brain and nervous system development. So it's nothing to mess around with. You're fine.

You're not going to have a baby.

[Kevin]
My brain's already not been developed. It's not going to develop anymore. It's just dying.

All the gray cells, you know, one by one. So here's a question for you. I'm going to put you on the spot.

And if you can't answer it, that's okay. Yeah, exactly. The pressure.

So with too much salt, there are lots of tests like blood pressure and all that. Are you aware of any tests for if you're iodine deficient before the goiter starts growing?

[Michelle]
You know, I don't know if that's part of a regular CVC blood panel or not. I'm going to say no. We need so little iodine and the problem was solved with table salt.

I don't think so, Kev. Honestly, I don't know the answer to that one. I would say I'm not a doctor.

I'm just an enthusiastic nutritionist. Thank you. But yeah, you know, hypothyroidism is no joke.

And it tends to often affect more women than men for some reason. Goiter affects more women than men. But I mean, anyone is at risk of it.

But you know, this is also, you know, leads to difficulty with weight loss, metabolism, being tired, sluggish, you know, having feeling like, you know, mental, sort of like difficulty thinking clearly, there's, there's all kinds of things. So, you know, it's just, I just find it really interesting that, you know, the solution, you know, back there in the 1920s was fixed the problem. And now we're, you know, food manufacturing our way back into the problem.

[Kevin]
Yeah, exactly. We're sort of going full circle and we're undoing all the good work that we did back in a simpler time when it was much more straightforward. But also, I mean, back then people cooked their own food and there was far less canned food.

And I think that's, that's a lot of the problem, the prepared food.

[Michelle]
Most food companies do not use iodized salt. I don't know what the reason for that is, but most food companies do not use it. And so the hidden salt in processed foods is the first obvious place to start, you know, trimming the excess sodium from your diet, read your food labels.

You know, don't, don't add it to your cooking excessively. If you're, if you are picking up things like, like you mentioned, like those salads with, with the pre-made salad dressing in it from the grocery store or whatever, like don't use all of it or get creative. Try with other things, discover your other, other herbs in your pantry.

They go a long way. I know they're expensive to buy those herbs, but they go a long way.

[Kevin]
That's the thing, a little bit goes a really, really long way and it adds so much and it can create a whole different feel when you suddenly discover these new flavors and there there's endless flavors, endless possibilities.

[Michelle]
Boom. Oh, I think we did it. That's a wrap.

[Kevin]
I think we did it. I think we did it. Okay.

So we're going to have our dad joke.

[Michelle]
Awesome. I can't wait. I'm sorry.

You still have me a dinosaur.

[Kevin]
Well, maybe we might have to get a series of, a series of t-shirts. I don't know. Okay.

So this is very apropos of today's discussion. Okay. I'm always told to take things with a grain of salt, but I prefer the whole shaker.

Ah, that's kind of predictable. Okay. Well, thank you, Michelle.

This has been, I've learned a ton today and I like it when I learn on the, I learn on this podcast and thank you listener for, for bringing up this, uh, this question to us.

[Michelle]
Yeah. And that's what it does for me too. It continues to put my lens back on to watch out for some of these finer details.

[Kevin]
Cause it makes you go through your fridge and your pantry and you're going to have to talk to some people in your household about their shopping habits.

[Michelle]
I was, I was actually surprised at myself when I started to dig around and I thought, you know what? I'm just going to be transparent about that. Like, yeah, I'm just real.

[Kevin]
I'm never letting you in my pantry.

[Michelle]
It's one of the things that I do when I did my program is that I would, I would have people do their cupboard clean out and just put everything in the, that they thought, you know, shouldn't be there in the center of their kitchen table and take a picture and send it to me. And it's what the, the, the folks that did it, it was always super enlightening and fun and it's empowering in a way. So that's a, that's a great exercise that anybody wants to do a little, just a little clean sweep of your cupboards, but for the, look on the label for the sugar content, look for the, the fat, the saturated fat and oil content and look for the salt and think about, you know, how can I do this differently?

[Kevin]
Yeah, that is something I do try to empty out my, or more organize my pantry every once in a while. And then I do look at things like, how did that get there?

[Michelle]
Yeah.

[Kevin]
So I try to keep it fresh.

[Michelle]
We live, we just live in a time where it's just so easy, like, and sometimes what's easy is what's real, right? What's easy is what you need, but then you just have to be a little bit more careful. Keep the main thing, the main thing, keep the main thing, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes.

[Kevin]
Exactly.

[Michelle]
As a dearly departed Dr. John McDougall used to say, the truth don't change. The truth is that it's whole foods that are the best for you.

[Kevin]
Exactly. Exactly. And definitely stay away from the sandwich meats.

Okay, people, they're just gross.

[Michelle]
They're disgusting.

[Kevin]
They are. Okay. Well, thank you, Michelle.

This has been very eye opening and I can't wait to see what we talk about next time. Me too. Until then, eat your greens unsalted or if salted, gently salted with some table salt with iodine.

[Michelle]
And be real everyone.

[Kevin]
My catchphrase is getting longer and longer and longer.

[Michelle]
I like how you adapt it to the moment.

[Kevin]
Yeah, exactly.

[Michelle]
You're such a free spirit.

[Kevin]
This has been Nutrition for Noobs. We hope you're a bit more enlightened about how your fantastic and complicated body works with the food you put into it. If you have a question or a topic you'd like Michelle to discuss, drop us a line at n4noobs at gmail.com.

That's the letter N, the number four, n-o-o-b-s at gmail.com. If you haven't already, you can subscribe to the podcast on whatever your favorite platform might be. Also, please consider leaving a review or telling your friends.

That's the best way to spread the word. We'll see you next time with another interesting topic. The views and opinions expressed on Nutrition for Noobs are those of the hosts.

It is not intended to be a substitute for medical, nutritional, or health advice. Listeners should seek a personal consultation with a qualified practitioner if they have any concerns or before commencing any actions mentioned in the podcast. Let's do our own theme song.

[Michelle]
I actually really love our intro.

[Kevin]
I think it's an amazing intro. When we came back, I toyed with changing it up and finding a new song, but then I decided, no, it's close to my heart. It's, yeah.

See, I don't even need to, I can sing it without, we don't even need it anymore.

[Michelle]
I picture like Animal from the Muppets.

[Kevin]
With Dr. Teeth on the piano. No, it was the dog, Rolf. Rolf on the piano.

Dr. Teeth was the guitarist, maybe. I can't remember.

[Michelle]
They were cool.

[Kevin]
I don't know. Anyways, welcome to Nutrition for Noobs, everyone.

[Michelle]
No, that's not the intro.

[Kevin]
Yes, that's the intro. That's officially the intro now. It's either going to be the intro or else it's going to be the excerpt at the end.

[Michelle]
I'm sure we've lost our listener already.

[Kevin]
Most likely, but this is not actually a podcast about the Muppets. This is Nutrition for Noobs.

[Michelle]
It is.