What is Kosher Salt

Kosher SaltSalt comes from the ocean. Even the salt that is mined from inland deposits originally came from the sea. The salt that is mined from the ocean itself is called ‘sea salt’. All other salts will have been mined from inland deposits.

Once the salt is mined it is then refined to make different types of salts. For instance, the common table salt that most people use has added iodine. Salt can also be ground into very small grains.

Kosher salt is a much larger grained salt than regular table salt and has an almost flaky appearance. In general, it contains no additives but this isn’t the reason that it is called kosher. In actual fact, the salt itself isn’t kosher or at least in most cases it isn’t.

A food that is kosher is made following Jewish dietary laws and just because a salt is called kosher doesn’t necessarily means it meets these guidelines. The reason that kosher salt gets its name is because of the way it is used in the curing process to create kosher meat. As part of Jewish dietary law, blood cannot be eaten so the role of kosher salt is to draw out the blood.

In terms of every day cooking, Kosher salt is used where a coarser salt is required. It is also often used for pickling. Table salt can cause the pickling liquid to go cloudy because of the iodine. As Kosher salt doesn’t have iodine it prevents this from happening.