"Designer" Salts Rising in Popularity

As the dietary sodium gets more and more attention from the media, the medical community, and the public, it appears that a "designer salt" may soon be taking the place of table salt and sodium in foods.

At least, that's what PepsiCo is thinking. According to the article about sodium and salts at fastcompany.com, in an effort to reduce the sodium in their foods PepsiCo has created a "designer salt" that will supposedly lower sodium without sacrificing flavor in their foods.

The designer salt contains crystals with a shape and size that slashes the amount of sodium ingested by people when they gobble down potato chips.

Hmmm, sounds a lot like sea salt to us.

You see, sea salt and other fancy salts have been gaining in popularity in recent years particularly because the size of the salt crystal allows for more flavor with less sodium content.

Of course too much salt is too much salt, and consumers pursuing a low sodium diet are advised to minimize salt consumption of any kind. But it's no secret that lower sodium salt combinations and sea salts have been used to add flavor and without negatively effecting health for a few years now.

On top of that sea salt offers a mineral content and unprocessed product that many health-food consumers find appealing.

So, will "designer" salt replace these other alternatives?

It's hard to tell, but for now the popularity of sea salt probably isn't in any danger. It has its own market and chemically produced products probably won't appeal to that demographic, even if they do enjoy gobbling some chips now and then.