A Healthier Salt Alternative For Our Favorite Dishes

by Toni Tiu

Having a warm bowl of soup on a rainy day is always comforting. One of my favorite comfort foods is miswa noodle soup. I like my miswa with patola (sponge gourd), but recently our family has been enjoying the noodles with kalabasa (squash). It’s a simple dish that’s big on comfort and vitamin A.

I recently wrote about PANSALT^® , a healthier salt alternative. PANSALT^® looks like common salt, has the texture of common salt and tastes like common salt. It is however lower in sodium and rich in magnesium, potassium and iodine. We tried it on this comfort dish to see if it would yield the same flavor. The verdict? Our miswa soup with kalabasa was just as delicious.

In my head it was even more delicious because we had seasoned it in a healthier way.

Miswa Soup with Kalabasa (Squash)

 2 bunches of miswa noodles

3 slices of squash, roughly chopped (around 2 cups)

1 small onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, chopped

5 cups water(or less, depends on how thick you want your soup to be)

¼ kilo ground pork (you can omit this for a vegetarian option)
1 tbsp oil
PANSALT^® to taste

pepper to taste

Heat oil. Saute onions and garlic until translucent. Stir in ground pork and cook till almost brown. Add water and bring to a boil. Add squash and cook until tender. Add miswa noodles, stirring constantly so the strands separate. Season with pepper and PANSALT^® to taste. Serve hot. 

We also tried PANSALT^® on fried fish, a good companion to this light yet filling soup. Instead of rock salt, the tilapia was seasoned with PANSALT^® prior to frying. Upon tasting the fried fish, I was happy to learn that it was just as appetizing.    

Why are we so conscious about our seasoning? I recently shared that my husband and I are trying to be more proactive in having healthy lifestyles. High common salt intake usually results to hypertension and other health problems. My friends and relatives who have hypertension take maintenance drugs that are expensive, and they have to drink the medicine for life. Their experiences are part of the motivation my husband and I want to live more healthily. We have become more aware of how we eat, and this definitely includes how we season our food. Investing in good ingredients that promote a healthy lifestyle is worth it.

Learning about a healthier salt alternative appealed to us, and we were excited to give it a whirl. After trying PANSALT^® on some of our favorite everyday dishes, it looks like we have got a new mainstay in the kitchen pantry.

PANSALT^® is a product of Finland, so I am glad that it’s available locally. It is available in selected outlets of Mercury Drug, Landmark supermarkets, Rustan’s supermarket and many other major supermarkets. 

Here’s to healthier meals with healthier seasonings! 

Learn more about PANSALT^® from their website: http://www.pansalt.ph.