EAT no more than six grams of this crystalline substance a day. Table salt, that ivory-colored crystalline mineral, is an astounding offering from the earth. The chemical symbol of salt is NaCl or sodium chloride.
Salt has many spiritual and industrial uses. For example, paper-making industries use salt to create caustic soda and chlorine. Caustic soda is needed to process wood fibers. Chlorine is needed to bleach the pulp.
The ivory crystal is also used to cure meat. Salt is used to flavor food and improve the taste of chocolate drinks. Next time you have a cup of chocolate drink, add a pinch of salt. The drink will be creamier and tastier.
In countries that have winter season, salt is used to melt the snow and to avoid the ice.
Salt was very important in ancient times. Roman soldiers were paid in real money but also partly with salt. In fact, the word salary comes from the word salarium, which in turn is derived from the word salt. In the same breath, salad received its name from salt.
Witches and other evil beings are said to be afraid of salt. They can’t stand salt. Why is this? There are many conjectures. One, salt is good and anything good can’t be applied to anything bad, like evil. Another idea theory has to do with how table salt is created.
Seawater is trapped in beds. The water evaporates and only the white stuff remains. Thus it is believed that salt gets a little help from Heaven. And anything from Heaven scares the evil one.
In my house, we use salt not just for cooking but also for cleaning purposes.
Forget using baking powder to clean yellow stains. I know how hard it is to remove black stains in bottles used to contain soy sauce. Drop four tablespoons of common salt into the bottle and add two drops of water. Shake the bottle until all the scum has been removed. This method also works for watermarks, scums on kitchen sinks and yellow stains in tiles.
It’s amazing how something so simple and cheap (you can buy one-fourth kilo for P10 at your neighborhood sari-sari or convenience store) can be such a great help in the house.