— Diane Dankert

So let's go back first to the origin of the salt because I think that that is, uh, a really important thing. Um, if you're using sea salt, think about where it comes from. It comes from what can be contaminated waters. So, uh, as the water evaporates and they pick the salt, it can have microplastics in it. Uh, so I would stay away from sea salt. A lot of people are recommending to use, uh, like a pink Himalayan salt or rock salt. And curiously, I went down again, the salt rabbit hole to see what, uh, commercial, uh, salt manufacturers were listing on their websites about microplastics in their salt. And much to my surprise, there was nothing mentioned. So it might be one of those things that, uh, aware citizens like Diane is, um, you know, bringing to us, uh, which I think is, uh, interesting. Now, uh, if you are a math person, which I'm not, but I love math facts, there are one to 10 microplastics per gram for gram. So that is 1000 milligrams. So in a thousand milligrams, if you multiply that, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll make it easy math. If you have a thousand milligrams, you're gonna multiply it times one. So per per day you would be getting in a half a teaspoon of salt, 10,000 microplastics. And as I continued down the salt rabbit hole in Korea, they, they have done massive studies about, uh, microplastics in soy sauce. And though that number is somewhat diminished than it is in what we'll call sodium chloride, there are microplastics in soy sauce. So I think that the message that I receive from this is that perhaps having ha learning to unwind our need for that salty flavor that may be using less soy sauce and using less sodium is a good way to take care and monitor some of the other foods that we are eating. So I have, I spent a couple of days, um, after our last event sort of, um, researching this because it fascinated me so much. So, uh, Diane, I wanna thank you so much for ask for sharing that question because I think that it has an impact of what we do. And I even watched a video and saw how microplastics can affect organs and other things like that. But if you're interested in it, there's lots of research out there and I think that you might find it interesting as well. So, you know, when we were on vacation last week, we, we went out for dinner a couple of times and, um, I feel like I have to give direction to the food server about how I want to have something prepared. And I would say no added salt. And then it would come to the table and it was like, Ugh, this is really salty. And then I would ask the waiter and he would say, no, he didn't add any salt. So maybe it was the way that they prepped it or whatever. So I think, uh, uh, I know a lot of people, not just myself who have very sensitive pals because salt is no longer the focal point of an ingredient when they cook.