Once you start looking for ways to cut down on the salt in your diet, you realize that salt is seemingly everywhere!

Even when it isn't listed as a named ingredient on a food label, it can be present in many food preservatives. It's in the baking soda used to leaven baked goods. A fast-food chicken sandwich isn't normally thought of as a “salty food,” yet it can contain more than 1,100 milligrams of sodium. A serving of canned soup can contain almost that much! Because of today's fast-paced lifestyle, you, too, probably rely to a certain extent on fast foods-whether you get them at a drive-up window or in the form of a convenience food at the supermarket.

Therefore, the task of cutting back on salt is already complicated for those who only want to reduce sodium consumption to the 2,400 milligrams a day recommended by the American Heart Association. If you have already developed a health concern that requires that you consume a reduced-salt diet, you'll need to pay even closer attention to food labels from now on. Regardless of which category you currently fall in, you can probably now better understand why it's important to control your sodium consumption.

Today's refined table salt is a single chemical compound, sodium chloride. Not only is table salt stripped of more than sixty trace minerals and essential macronutrients, it's then bleached and anticaking agents are added so it's easier to pour or sprinkle. This results in a chemical that's difficult for the body to absorb and digest, which then causes the health problems mentioned earlier, such as high blood pressure.

For that reason, many people find that their body is better able to handle the salt they ingest if that salt is in a form closest to its natural state as possible. Sodium content will be the same whether you're using table salt or sea salt, but you may find that because of its purer, less chemical flavor, it takes less sea salt to season food.

Kosher salt can also be an alternative but, because of its larger crystals, it doesn't always absorb as well — and for some people it takes more kosher salt than table or sea salt to achieve the desired effect. For that reason, as far as the recipes in this book are concerned, table salt or sea salt are interchangeable. Unless your dietitian provides you with specific instructions to the contrary, it's your choice as to whether you use table or sea salt.

In addition to cutting down on how much salt you add to your food, making wise choices about which ingredients you use when preparing meals can make a big difference. While there are now other reduced-sodium (and reduced- or no-fat) products on the market, the nutritional analyses for those products vary widely. Reduced-sodium foods often contain more sugar; reduced-fat foods usually contain more sodium than do regular products.

When choosing a shortcut, always try to pick the one that offers the lowest sodium content. To help you recognize what those labels mean when you're looking for low-sodium products, here are the common explanations for what the phrases on those labels mean:

• Sodium-Free: 5 milligrams or less of sodium per serving

• Very Low Sodium: 35 milligrams or less of sodium per serving

• Low Sodium: 140 milligrams or less of sodium per serving

• Reduced or Less Sodium: A minimum of 25 percent less sodium than the regular version

• Light in Sodium: 50 percent less sodium than the regular version

• Salt-Free: 5 milligrams or less of sodium per serving

• Low Sodium Meal: 140 milligrams or less of sodium per 100 grams

• No Added Salt or Unsalted: a product that no salt was added to during processing; however, this does not mean that the product does not contain sodium, as there can be sodium occurring naturally in the food