Salt and Me

I made two delicious loaves of bread this evening, and as they came out of the oven, I cut off a few slices for Mr. Barefoot and me.  As soon as I bit into my slice, a realization hit me.  I forgot the salt.

This wasn't the first time.  It wasn't even the second.  It wasn't even the second time I forgot it in this particular type of bread.  It was, in fact, probably more like the fifth.  Usually I remember before the bread actually goes into the oven, and hastily add it.  This time, no such luck.  Which is a shame, because this time I used bread flour and the loaves were unusually light and fluffy.  (Maybe it was worth the extra $4?)

But I don't add salt to things.  Not to most recipes, especially not before tasting them and thinking, "something is missing".  Often not before my husband tastes them and says, "honey, you forgot salt again."

Why my fear of salt?  My father.  You know how my unhealthy fear of butter came mostly from my mother?  My fear of salt comes directly from Papa Barefoot, who has high blood pressure and is incredibly sensitive to sodium in foods.  My Dad can swell up and gain something like 5-10lbs from eating high-sodium meals alone.  So he doesn't salt his food.  And remember that Papa Barefoot does all the cooking.  So I grew up without eating a lot of salt, putting salt in pasta as it cooked, or generally adding salt to food.

Unlike butter though, as a grownup, I know that salt is delicious, and that it's not that bad for us.  What is bad is processed food.  So as long as we continue to make most of our food ourselves, and not salt it too much, we're okay.  My swim coach also recommended salting my food to reduce foot cramps, but I think she meant iodized salt, which we don't keep in the house.  It's on the grocery list though, because I started getting bad foot cramps again recently, and I'm not drinking pickle juice like my mother-in-law tells me to.