If you prefer the taste of unsalted nuts, by all means, purchase them.
If you are avoiding them because of perceived health-risks involving salt, you have been conned or you are a nut yourself.
If you are leading a crusade against the evils of salt, you probably work for the government.
Scientific American
Quote:For decades, policy makers have tried and failed to get Americans to eat less salt. In April 2010 the Institute of Medicine urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regulate the amount of salt that food manufacturers put into products; New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg...convinced 16 companies to do so voluntarily. But if the U.S. does conquer salt, what will we gain? Bland french fries, for sure. But a healthy nation? Not necessarily.
Quote:...a meta-analysis of seven studies involving a total of 6,250 subjects in the American Journal of Hypertension found no strong evidence that cutting salt intake reduces the risk for heart attacks, strokes or death in people with normal or high blood pressure.
Esquire
Quote:For thirty years, salt has been Public Enemy No. 1 in the kitchens of the misguided and health-obsessed. Back in 1976, Jean Mayer, then president of Tufts University, called salt "the most dangerous food additive of all." Four years later, The New York Times linked excessive consumption of salt to high blood pressure, heart and kidney disease, and stroke. The die had been cast. Salt was an evil thing to be avoided at all costs.
Quote:"Indeed, the controversy over the benefits, if any, of salt reduction now constitutes one of the longest running, most vitriolic, and surreal disputes in all of medicine," wrote Gary Taubes in Science.
NY Times
Quote:“You can say without any shadow of a doubt,” as I was told then by Drummond Rennie, an editor for The Journal of the American Medical Association, that the authorities pushing the eat-less-salt message had “made a commitment to salt education that goes way beyond the scientific facts.”
The NIH got it into it's institutional brain that salt was bad for us, based on extremely limited evidence and the crusade was on. Despite growing evidence that salt did not present a significant health risk and certainly wasn't the "killer" so-called education efforts claimed, the government's crusade pressed on and the media joined the ranks.
It has been known for years now that the dangers of salt was a myth (I recall reading an article debunking the myth at least 10 years ago) but if you surveyed the American public on the matter, I am quite certain you would find that a majority of those polled (and a healthy sized majority at that) would be sure that salt presented a health risk...even though in their daily lives they ignored it.
If Health "Nuts" are, indeed, responsible for the removal of salted nuts from your supermarket shelves, they truly are nuts. This misinformation is still being peddled and, unfortunately acted upon (see reference to Mayor Nanny Bloomberg) and the nutty zeal of a few nutty organizations has even led, within recent years, to suits being filed against the FDA pushing for tight restriction of salt in American food products.
Some doctors have now opined that if anyone actually followed prior (and for all I know they may remain current) government recommendation on individual salt intake, they could easily find themselves in a heath crisis.
But the government told us salt was bad? Do you mean we can't trust the government to be giving us scientifically proven information?
So if you don't like salty nuts, don't eat them, but if you do, don't worry. The positive nutritional value of nuts is not being undermined by a proportionately greater danger of salt.
You won't get it on your store bought packaged nuts, but you might want to consider using unrefined salt on your home table. "Himalayan Salt" is colorful (grains range from light pink to red) and contains additional necessary minerals. It's a lot courser that refined table salt but you can purchase it in "grinder" bottles as you can with whole pepper corns. I find it "saltier" than refined salt so if you can't shake yourself free from the myths, you'll be consuming less.
