Fermenting and pickling recipes typically call for a pretty good amount of salt. Between 2 tsp and 2 TBSP per quart of liquid.
The salt provides an essential benefit – it deters the growth of harmful microbes until thriving populations of good bacteria acidify the liquid enough to continue to deter the nasties.
While you CAN ferment without salt, there is a higher failure rate, and it is more sensitive to temperature, contamination, and even the quality of water you are using. This is why most fermenting systems do not recommend fermenting without salt.
So, do you have to worry about the amount of salt in the fermented foods?
In general, no. But it does depend on the OTHER foods you are eating.
If you are eating a diet of refined foods, there is salt in EVERYTHING, even foods that do not need it! Not only that, there are other forms of sodium that are even more harmful in excess than simple sodium chloride. Generally, those forms are the ones that cause the majority of health issues.
Salt is ESSENTIAL for good health. You need more of it when exercising, or in warm weather when you sweat more.
If you are cooking your foods from scratch, using ingredients that do not already have salt added, then you will have to ADD salt to your diet. If you do not, you will become deficient, and that can cause a medical emergency.
How do you know how much? Once you get used to NOT eating refined foods, just salt to taste. One of the reason men have a reputation for reaching for the salt shaker is because they do, in fact, require more salt than women, due to the larger body size. Active men, especially.
If you are not heavily salting everything, then salty fermented foods just end up being a good and healthy source of salt. You eat what tastes right – if the fermented food tastes good, then you need it.
You’ll need to find a balance with your brine – and you can judge that by taste as well. If it tastes good to you, then you probably got it right. If it tastes too salty, then you need to reduce the amount of salt in the next ferment. You’ll get it right in a few tries.
A refined food diet gets your taste buds all out of balance, and you get to where you can’t really trust it to tell you what you need. But after you’ve been on a more natural food diet for a time, your taste buds balance back out again. You start to crave whole grains and fresh fruits and veggies, and clean meats and dairy. And sometimes you crave salt.
When you do, reach for a pickle.
There is no need for guilt when you are eating well.