The War on Salt—and Personal Freedom—Heats Up

posted at 4:42 pm on June 9, 2010 by Howard Portnoy

The dark forces of big government may have won the first round, with H. J. Heinz Company’s capitulation to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s demands to cut the salt in its world-famous ketchup. The war, however, is just getting started.

Food giant Cargill has mounted a massive information campaign intended to educate the public on the grim realities of saltless or significantly salt-reduced food. For the campaign, which has been dubbed Salt 101, the company has enlisted the services of Food Network celebrity cook Alton Brown, who in a video describes salt as “a pretty amazing compound.”

For his role in the campaign, Brown has been branded by various media outlets and representatives in government as a traitor and a sell-out. His crime? Telling the truth.

Cargill is not the only food conglomerate fighting back against Bloomberg’s National Salt Reduction Initiative. ConAgra has commissioned two studies that suggest that the government could save billions of dollars in health care and lost productivity costs by educating Americans—who are notorious over-eaters—on how to eat sensible portions, rather than continue to stuff their faces while merely ingesting less salt.

Kellogg is making its own case for the importance of salt as an ingredient in virtually everything we eat, including sweet foods, by having tasters sample some of its biggest-selling products with the salt removed. The results have been eye-opening.

In one tasting, the target product was Cheez-It snack crackers. Made without salt, the crackers were judged to be sticky when chewed, forming a mush which became packed into the molar teeth. The taste wasn’t just bland but downright medicinal. Even the signature bright yellow color became somewhat dull and muddied in the absence of salt.

The reasons for these changes all relate to the science behind salt. Salt activates taste receptors on the tongue, which in turn produce enzymes, creating something of a “buzz” or awakening. Salt is the chemical responsible for the crunch in a product such as Cheez-Its. Salt in the dough blocks the tang that develops during fermentation.

Barack Obama, current king of government over-regulation, spoke in his inaugural address of restoring “science to its rightful place.” Even if one accepts the dubious premise that science was somehow ignored or diminished prior to his arrival in the Oval Office, Obama has failed to make good on his promise, ignoring, for example, scientific studies indicating that subsidized green jobs are “an economic black hole.” Will government now accord science its rightful place in its assault on salt? If not, our taste buds will be the first casualties of the conflict.

Blowback