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Weight Loss Forum / General Topics / March 2005What's in my salt?
Lately I have been trying to limit not only my calories, but also the amount of salt I eat, so I've been using a diet salt they sell here in the Netherlands. It has 41% NaCl, 41% KCl, 17% MgCl, 0.1% calcium, 0.005% iodine, and 0.895% 'trace elements'. I would like to enter it in Fitday as a custom food, but the problem is, I've no idea how to calculate the amounts of sodium, potassium and magnesium. I've found a site that has the atomic weights of the elements: sodium 22.989770(2), potassium 39.0983, magnesium 24.3006(6), chlorine 35.4527(9); but I've had just 1 year of chemistry at school, and that was a looong time ago, so that still doesn't tell me anything. Does anyone here know enough chemistry to calculate it for me? aTdHvAaNnKcSe, Berna (101.5/73.3/~68 kg)  Signature( )_( ) Berna M. Bleeker-Slikker / . . \ berna.bleeker@gmail.com \ \@/ / http://www.volksliedjes.nl > Lately I have been trying to limit not only my calories, but also the > amount of salt I eat, so I've been using a diet salt they sell here in [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > so that still doesn't tell me anything. Does anyone here know enough > chemistry to calculate it for me? I do not think that you need to know the atomic weights. If the percentages that you listed above are by weight, then, take the grams of salt that you ate, multiply it by the percentage number and divide by 100, you would get the grams of elements that you mentioned. If you, say, ate 10 grams of that "salt", you would have eaten 4.1 grams of NaCL etc. Remember, all that a percent (%) is 1/100. There is no more to the notion of a percent than knowing that one percent is 1/100. Signature223/173.3/180 > > Lately I have been trying to limit not only my calories, but also the > > amount of salt I eat, so I've been using a diet salt they sell here in [quoted text clipped - 18 lines] > Remember, all that a percent (%) is 1/100. There is no more to the > notion of a percent than knowing that one percent is 1/100. The weight have use if you only want the potassium. 100 grams of salt at 41% KCl is 41 grams of FCl. The ratio of K to Cl is 39/(39+35), basically half plus. Half plus of 41 grams is about 21 grams. So 100 grams of the salt would be about 21 grams of potassium. More decimal places aren't going to help mcuh. Since daily target for potassium is 1-2 grams, you'd want 5-10 grams of the salt daily minus your best guess at potassium in food. In the US that's about what Lite Salt is, but it's an even better mixture since it includes magnesium. Call it a teaspoon per day. Doug Freyburger schreef: >>>Lately I have been trying to limit not only my calories, but also > [quoted text clipped - 50 lines] > grams of potassium. More decimal places aren't going to help > mcuh. And the ratio of Na to Cl would be 23/(23+35), right? > Since daily target for potassium is 1-2 grams, you'd want 5-10 > grams of the salt daily minus your best guess at potassium in [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > better mixture since it includes magnesium. Call it a teaspoon > per day. Thank you very much! :-) Now I can track the amount of sodium and potassium I eat. Yet another thing to measure. I'm turning into a health freak, no doubt - but I don't want to have my fingers, feet & cheeks swell up from eating too much salt; my blood pressure has always been good, even though I used to eat a *lot* of salt, but this bloating can't be healthy (and the extra weight shows up on the scale, too). Berna (101.5/73.1/~68 kg) Signature( )_( ) Berna M. Bleeker-Slikker / . . \ berna.bleeker@gmail.com \ \@/ / http://www.volksliedjes.nl > > The weight have use if you only want the potassium. > [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > > And the ratio of Na to Cl would be 23/(23+35), right? Times the percentage of NaCl in your salt. Correct. > > Since daily target for potassium is 1-2 grams, you'd want 5-10 > > grams of the salt daily minus your best guess at potassium in [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > Thank you very much! :-) Now I can track the amount of sodium and > potassium I eat. Low carbers like lite salt (50-50 sodium chloride and potassium chloride) for the extra potassium. Low fatters like lite salt for the lower sodium. The stuff's a wonder product. Doug Freyburger schreef: >>>The weight have use if you only want the potassium. >> [quoted text clipped - 22 lines] > chloride) for the extra potassium. Low fatters like lite salt > for the lower sodium. The stuff's a wonder product. So it is, and IMO it tastes just as good as pure NaCl. And I don't have to use more of it; today I cooked my evening meal (2 chicken breasts and a big pak-choi salad) with just 0.3 teaspoon. Total sodium today 1892 mg, potassium 5644. :-) Berna (101.5/73/~68 kg) Signature( )_( ) Berna M. Bleeker-Slikker / . . \ berna.bleeker@gmail.com \ \@/ / http://www.volksliedjes.nl > Doug Freyburger schreef: > [quoted text clipped - 73 lines] > > Berna (101.5/73.1/~68 kg) FWIW, Dutch teaspoons are half the size of British ones (ie 5 ml vs 10 ml). Dunno about American teaspoons. jake schreef: >> Doug Freyburger schreef: >> [quoted text clipped - 76 lines] > FWIW, Dutch teaspoons are half the size of British ones (ie 5 ml vs 10 > ml). Dunno about American teaspoons. Google says an American teaspoon is 4.92892161 ml, which is close enough to a Dutch teaspoon for me. BTW, it also says "1 Imperial teaspoon = 5.91939047 ml" when you ask it "1 british teaspoon in ml". Did you know you can convert almost any units with Google? See http://www.googleguide.com/calculator.html and http://www.waxy.org/archive/2003/08/14/fun_with.shtml. I use this all the time to convert units for entering stuff in Fitday. Berna (101.5/73/~68 kg) Signature( )_( ) Berna M. Bleeker-Slikker / . . \ berna.bleeker@gmail.com \ \@/ / http://www.volksliedjes.nl > jake schreef: > [quoted text clipped - 88 lines] > > Berna (101.5/73/~68 kg) Thank you for the info, very itneresting. My source was Johannes van Dam, who says teaspoons are often translated wrong in cookbooks. > > Lately I have been trying to limit not only my calories, but also the > > amount of salt I eat, so I've been using a diet salt they sell here in [quoted text clipped - 18 lines] > Remember, all that a percent (%) is 1/100. There is no more to the > notion of a percent than knowing that one percent is 1/100. The weight have use if you only want the potassium. 100 grams of salt at 41% KCl is 41 grams of FCl. The ratio of K to Cl is 39/(39+35), basically half plus. Half plus of 41 grams is about 21 grams. So 100 grams of the salt would be about 21 grams of potassium. More decimal places aren't going to help mcuh. Since daily target for potassium is 1-2 grams, you'd want 5-10 grams of the salt daily minus your best guess at potassium in food. In the US that's about what Lite Salt is, but it's an even better mixture since it includes magnesium. Call it a teaspoon per day. |
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