M01Kerala Garam Masala
The southern register — aromatic, not earthy
M07
The 70:30 Salt
Seventy per cent sodium chloride, thirty per cent potassium chloride
Photograph: Adobe Stock · representative of the dish
The re-engineeringThree-tenths of the sodium chloride in your salt cellar, replaced with potassium chloride. Nothing about how you cook changes. A level teaspoon carries about 1,650 mg of sodium instead of about 2,360 mg, and brings about 940 mg of potassium with it.
Seventy per cent sodium chloride, thirty per cent potassium chloride [VEGAN]
> ## READ THIS BEFORE YOU MAKE IT > Potassium-enriched salt is not for everyone. Do not use this blend, or any potassium-based salt substitute, without your doctor's approval if you have chronic kidney disease, or if you take a RAAS inhibitor — an ACE inhibitor (names ending -pril, such as enalapril or ramipril) or an angiotensin receptor blocker (names ending -sartan, such as losartan or telmisartan) — or a potassium-sparing diuretic (spironolactone, eplerenone, amiloride), or a potassium supplement. All of these raise the risk of hyperkalaemia, a high blood potassium level, which can be dangerous. If you are not certain what your medicines are, ask the pharmacist who dispenses them before you make this jar. This book does not tell anyone to change or stop a medicine.
This is the most consequential single swap in the book, and the evidence is unusually direct. The Salt Substitute and Stroke Study randomised 20,995 participants in 600 Chinese villages — all with a previous stroke, or aged 60 and over with poorly controlled blood pressure — to a 70% sodium chloride / 30% potassium chloride substitute or to regular salt, and followed them for a mean of 4.7 years. Stroke fell 14%, major adverse cardiovascular events 13%, and all-cause mortality 12% (Neal et al., 2021). Hyperkalaemia events did not differ significantly between groups — in a population screened for normal renal function, which is exactly why the carve-out above exists.
The 70:30 Salt
Active 5 minutes Total 5 minutes
Scale
200 servings
Ingredients — tap to tick off
- ✓140 g fine sea salt or table salt (sodium chloride)
- ✓60 g potassium chloride, food grade
- ✓5 g (2 tsp) raw rice, or a few dried curry leaves, as a desiccant in the jar
Allergens: None of the major allergens.
Equipment: Digital scale reading to 1 g; dry glass jar with a tight lid. No substitute for the scale: eyeballing this blend is how you end up at 50:50 and taste it.
Method — tap a step to mark it done, tap a time to start a timer
- Weigh both salts separately into a dry bowl. Any moisture will cake the blend permanently, so dry the bowl and the spoon.
- Mix thoroughly with a dry spoon for 60–90 seconds, until the blend is a single uniform white with no visible difference in crystal size. Potassium chloride crystals are often coarser and will settle if you undermix, so the first spoonfuls come out mild and the last metallic.
- Transfer to the jar with the rice or curry leaves, and label it clearly. 70:30 — not for anyone on kidney or blood-pressure medicines is not an over-cautious label in a shared kitchen.
- Shake the jar before each use.
Why this worksPotassium chloride tastes salty because the potassium ion, like sodium, activates the tongue's salt channels — but less efficiently, and it additionally triggers bitter receptors, which is why the substitution has a ceiling. Meanwhile the two ions do opposite things to blood pressure: raised potassium gives about −3.5/−2.0 mmHg in hypertensive adults (Aburto et al., 2013). One swap moves both levers the right way.
Sourcing note
Food-grade potassium chloride is sold as "potassium salt" or "low-sodium salt substitute" in pharmacies, health-food shops and online, and as lo-salt style products in most Western supermarkets. Read the label: many commercial low-sodium salts are already a sodium–potassium blend, in which case you are buying this ready-made and should not add further sodium chloride. Never use potassium chloride sold for water softeners, de-icing or laboratory use.
If you are watching…
Blood pressure: switching every gram of salt in your cooking to this blend cuts sodium 30% at no effort. A household using 8 g of salt a day drops from about 3,150 mg to about 2,200 mg of sodium without changing a recipe. That is additive with the DASH-style pattern this book is built on, and most of the gain from sodium reduction comes below 2,300 mg a day.
Kidney disease or RAAS inhibitors: do not use this. Re-read the box above.
Swap it
80:20 → gentler on the palate, less benefit, and a sensible starting ratio for a household that objects to the taste. Move to 70:30 over a month.
Commercial low-sodium salt → often already 66:34 or similar. Use it as bought; do not blend it with more table salt.
Cannot use potassium salt at all → Chapter 10 and M06 are for you. Acid, aroma, pungency and gradual reduction get most of the way there.
Make ahead · store · freeze
Cupboard indefinitely — salt does not spoil. Replace the desiccant every 3 months. Do not freeze; condensation on thawing will cake the jar solid.
Leftovers
There are no leftovers, only a jar that clumps in a humid kitchen. Break the clumps with the back of a spoon, add a few grains of dry rice to the jar, and keep it away from the steam of the hob. If it has hardened into a solid block, spread it on a tray in a low oven for 10 minutes, cool completely and re-jar.
Troubleshooting
Metallic aftertaste: the blend separated in the jar, or you are using it as a finishing salt. Shake it, and finish with plain salt.
Caked: moisture. Dry on a tray at 100°C (210°F) for 20–25 minutes, cool completely, break up and re-jar.
Serve with
R015 Matta Rice, Properly Cooked · R063 Cabbage Thoran · R059 Sambar · R040 Nadan Kozhi Curry · R117 Sadya Parippu with Ghee — and, in fact, every savoury recipe in this book that calls for salt, unless the safety box above applies to you.
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