Mineral Salt

Mineral salts are unique because they are unrefined essential dietary nutrients that all living things utilize. Natural mineral salts include Celtic Sea Salt, Pink Himalayan salt, and Redmond salt. These salts contain over 80 essential minerals and natural elements, providing the body with the proper balance of sodium, chloride, and other minerals, as well as trace elements and moisture.

Ordinary table salt is “refined” and contains higher amounts of sodium and chloride than natural mineral salts. When processed, it is stripped of essential minerals and moisture, giving it a longer shelf life but leaving it lifeless.

“Unrefined” salt is a crystallized mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride and is processed from salt mines, evaporation from seawater (sea salt), or mineral-rich spring water in shallow pools. This natural salt helps detoxify harmful chemicals in our bodies, including bromine, which depletes the body of iodine —a critical nutrient for preventing thyroid disorders and breast cancer.

One way to tell if your salt contains trace minerals is by color. Regular table salt is bleached and very white, but natural mineral salts come from deep within the earth, contain many minerals, and have a beautiful pink color with speckles.

Salt is an essential nutrient, and the amount of salt in the diet influences health. Too much salt can raise blood pressure and increase the risk of heart attack and stroke, but using natural, “unrefined” salt does not cause heat or water retention in the body.

Adding the correct type of salt to your diet can help with blood pressure, cholesterol, fatigue, headaches, sinus and respiratory issues, muscle cramps, stress (adrenal) disorders, thyroid problems, and immune system function, and can increase bone strength.

Salt is one of the six tastes (sweet, sour, salty, pungent, bitter, and astringent). Ayurveda believes that mineral salts enkindle the digestive fire (Agni) and stimulate the appetite, enhancing the sense of taste. Salt helps digest natural toxins (Ama) and clears the body's channels. This salt calms the nervous system and emotions, helping ground excess Vata dosha.

Ayurvedic Energetics:

      Rasa (taste): salty, sweet

      Virya (action): cooling

      Vipaka (post-digestive effect): sweet

      Doshas (constitutions): balancing for Vata may increase Pitta and Kapha.