Midnight, and you are making a pack of instant noodles. You flip it over out of habit and see the line "Sodium: 1,500mg".
Milligrams, sounds tiny. One and a half thousand milligrams is only one and a half grams, right?
Not quite. Sodium is not salt. And 1,500mg of sodium converts to nearly 4g of salt, almost the whole day's salt benchmark suggested by the World Health Organization. This is one conversion every label reader should know by heart.
In this article
Sodium is not salt, but salt contains sodium
Table salt is chemically sodium chloride, formula NaCl. It has two parts:
- Sodium (Na): about 40% of the weight.
- Chloride (Cl): the remaining 60% or so.
Nutrition labels usually list sodium, not salt. That is because sodium does not only come from salt. MSG, baking soda and some preservatives contain sodium too. Listing sodium catches it all.
Your body genuinely needs sodium. It helps hold water, carry nerve signals and contract muscles. The only problem is that most of us eat quite a bit more than we need.
The 2.5 trick: learn it once, use it for life
Because sodium is about 40% of salt, the conversion is very neat:
Sodium × 2.5 = Salt
The other way round: Salt × 0.4 = Sodium
| Sodium on the label | Salt equivalent |
|---|---|
| 400mg | 1g |
| 1,000mg | 2.5g |
| 1,500mg | about 3.8g |
| 2,000mg | 5g |
| 2,300mg | about 5.8g, roughly 1 teaspoon of salt |
A small note to be fair: the times-2.5 rule assumes all the sodium comes from salt. If a food contains MSG or baking soda, the real salt amount will be a little lower. But for a quick estimate, this conversion is good enough.
The European Union even requires labels to show a "salt" line instead of sodium, calculated with exactly this times-2.5 rule. So if you pick up an imported European product, the number is already converted for you.
How much salt do Vietnamese people eat?
WHO recommends adults eat under 5g of salt a day, which is under about 2,000mg of sodium. Five grams is less than one level teaspoon.
And in Vietnam? According to the Ministry of Health's 2015 national survey, adults ate an average of about 9.4g of salt a day. Nearly double the suggested level.
WHO sets this benchmark because eating very salty food over a long time is linked to blood pressure. It is a recommendation for the whole population, not a reason to worry over every grain of salt.
The interesting part is that most salt does not come from the salt shaker on the table. It hides in dipping sauces, seasonings and packaged foods.
Where does sodium hide in a Vietnamese kitchen?
The Vietnamese kitchen has plenty of "salty sources" that do not carry the name salt:
- Nước mắm (fish sauce): one tablespoon can hold about 1,400mg of sodium, depending on the brand (per USDA data).
- Hạt nêm and bột canh (seasoning granules and seasoning salt): the main ingredient is usually salt, plus MSG.
- MSG: also contains sodium, but only about a third as much as the same amount of salt.
- Soy sauce, oyster sauce, chili sauce: saltier than you think.
- Instant noodles, sausages, chả lụa (Vietnamese pork roll), chà bông (meat floss), pickles, dried meat and fish: processed foods are often high in sodium.
- Nước lèo (noodle soup broth): a boldly seasoned pot of phở or bún bò means that when you drain the bowl, you drink the salt too.
About sea salt and pink salt: they are still mostly sodium chloride. The crystals may be bigger or the color prettier, but gram for gram, the sodium is not very different.
Less salty without being bland
Good news: your taste buds are fairly easy to "train". Researchers found that after a few weeks of eating less salt, people start to prefer lower saltiness. Old favorites suddenly taste salty.
A few easy tips:
- Mix your nước chấm (dipping sauce) lighter, with more lime, garlic and chili. Sour and spicy notes make food taste bold without extra fish sauce.
- Season last. Season when the dish is almost done, and you taste it more clearly and usually use less.
- Use herbs and spices: lemongrass, ginger, pepper, lime leaves, Vietnamese coriander. Their aroma fills the gap left by salt.
- Leave some broth behind. Eat the noodles and toppings, drink less of the soup.
- Read the labels on packaged foods, and multiply sodium by 2.5 to see how much salt you are eating.
To compare two packs quickly, you can also look at the percentage column. The article on what is %DV explains the 5 and 20 rule.
Inside the kOBE kitchen
kOBE's Sous Vide Chicken Breast is only soaked in sea salt, then cooked sous vide. No sauce, no seasoning granules. So the seasoning is in your hands.
A kitchen tip: when you use the chicken breast in a salad or rice bowl, taste before adding any dipping sauce. The meat already has a little salt, so sometimes a squeeze of lime, some pepper and fresh herbs are all it needs. See Sous Vide Chicken Breast on the Ingredients page.
When you cook from our recipe page, you can also use a little less fish sauce than the recipe says. Tasting and adding later is always easier than oversalting and then trying to dilute it.
Frequently asked questions
Do sea salt and pink salt have less sodium than regular salt?
Is MSG saltier than salt?
How can I tell if a food is high in sodium?
Keep reading
Sources
- WHO (2012). Guideline: Sodium intake for adults and children.
- Ministry of Health (Vietnam) (2016). National Survey on the Risk Factors of Non-communicable Diseases (STEPS) Viet Nam 2015 (Điều tra quốc gia yếu tố nguy cơ bệnh không lây nhiễm).
- USDA FoodData Central: fish sauce, table salt.
- Bertino M., Beauchamp G.K., Engelman K. (1982). Long-term reduction in dietary sodium alters the taste of salt. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 36(6):1134 to 1144.
- European Union. Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 (rule for declaring "salt" as sodium × 2.5).
- Further reading: Understanding Nutrition 16th ed., chapter 12.
