Next Steps Part I: Small Steps

There was another tomato recall last week. Salmonella. Hmm.

But that's not what todays post is about, oh Loyal 3 or 4 readers.  After a crazy month of work, traveling, and social engagements, things have calmed down.  Spring has sprung (or has tried to as much as it can in Chicago).  And with the new season, a new feeling of Au Naturale complacency has set in.

Not complacency towards the Au Naturale lifestyle, my friends.  More like feeling like I'm on autopilot again, wondering if I'm doing enough to really be making a dent.  Is it time for change?  Yes, in my opinion, time for some changes big and small.  Perhaps looking over my diet and making many small changes, I can bring myself closer to becoming completely Au Naturale.  Big changes, done correctly, will not only assist in the same goal and allow me to call myself not only an additive-free human, but also a locavore with confidence.

But first the small changes.  Every day when I look in my cupboards I see a variety of potential red flags staring back at me. Salt, for example.  Seems pretty simple, but what must salt go through to get to my plate?  I have thought about this before, in fact.  There is a big Morton's Salt warehouse on my way to and from home and occasionally one of the big steel doors will be cracked open, garnering me a glimpse inside.  Typically, what I see in the 3 seconds I have to look as I drive past is a huge pile of salt, 8 or 10 or more feet high, just sitting on the floor.  Sitting on the floor!  I certainly hope it goes through some sort of decontamination process after that.  But at the same time, I fear whatever that decontamination process may be.

I happened to mention this to my brother a while back.  He just shrugged.  "Where do you think salt comes from?" he asked.  True enough... I guess.  But still, I wonder what happens to that salt during the journey from the floor of that warehouse to the blue cylinder in my cabinet.

Well, again, to the research I go.  Log story short, most table salts contain additives, not least of which is an anti-caking agent like calcium silicate to keep it from clumping in humid conditions and flowing freely from the small holes in your salt shaker.  Add that to the pollution from the mining process that is either left in or goes through a chemical bath to eliminate, and such a simple and necessary element is looking less and less Au Naturale than I would like.

So what to do?  I can make a lot of condiments, but salt ain't one of them.  My research shows that switching to Celtic sea salt or Himalayan salt is the way to go. Both are unrefined so they maintain more naturally-occuring minerals, and come from less polluted sources. They are also a natural source of iodine, a necessary nutrient.  Table salt has iodine added, but mainly because the naturally-ocurring iodine gets stripped away during the refinement process.

And there we have the result of small change #1. Many containers of salt in my apartment will now be donated to whoever needs or wants it (are you a loyal Chicago-based reader who would like some?) and a subtle yet important change to the diet commences.  Now let's step over to the next cabinet and see what else needs to be tweaked...