the many uses of salt

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The Many Uses of Salt
Salt is made up of sodium and chlorine and it is a natural occurrence on our planet, it can be found and harvested mainly from the seas, oceans or salt lakes. However salt can also be mined from within the earth from dried up underground seas, normally it’s only used as road salt (maldonsalt). The product salt has multiple functions, Salt is used to preserve foods and also to flavor foods, salt can also be used as a stabilizer in water and rock salt is used to melt ice during the winter (Freeman, 2007).
Salt and our bodies. Salt inside our bodies is an electrolyte which helps conduct the electricity throughout our bodies, it is not a natural mineral in our bodies and that is why we eat it. However if too much salt is ingested it could cause our organs to stop working because they can’t keep up with the intake. Also hypernatremia, a common deficiency is when not enough salt is ingested or sodium is lost from the body to quickly. Ultimately this deficiency can lead to our brain swelling and even death (Freeman, 2007).
Types of salt. There are many different types of salt that we use for cooking, however it all comes down to four basic categories of salt, kosher salt, rock salt, table salt and sea salt. Table salt, kosher salt and sea salt are all food grade salt and according to the FDA each one of these salts must contain at least 97.5% sodium chloride, the remaining 2.5% is usually other chemicals that come from processing the salts (Freeman, 2007).
Table salt. Table salt is the most common salt and the one we use most. However even table salt comes in different way, it can come iodized or non-iodized. Iodizing salt started in the early 1900’s due an iodine deficiency in kids, this was a contributing facto...

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...it comes in many shapes, sizes and colors. Salt can be used in savory cooking and it can be used in sweet cooking. Salt is a natural preservative that we have been using for thousands of years, with many other purposes salt is used almost every day by us humans from cooking with it to putting it on our driveways in the winter and sometimes even cleaning with it. Salt is a very much used and needed ingredient in our lives today.

Works Cited

Freeman, Shanna. "How Salt Works” 27 November 2007. HowStuffWorks.com
(online)
http://www.maldonsalt.co.uk/About-Salt-Where-does-Salt-come-from.html (online) http://www.saltinstitute.org/food/overview/ (online)
Moncel, Bethany. “Functions of salt in food” http://foodreference.about.com/od/Ingredients_Basics/a/Functions-Of-Salt-In-Food.htm (online)

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