Kosher Salt Substitutes: Which Salt to Use, and How Much, by Brand and Job

Kosher salt is coarse-grained sodium chloride, named for its traditional use in koshering meat.¹² Any food-grade salt can replace it, because salt is the same compound whatever its source,¹ and in America’s Test Kitchen’s test, broths seasoned with equal weights of the two big kosher brands tasted exactly the same.³ The real problem is the spoon. A teaspoon of Morton kosher salt weighs 4.8 grams and a teaspoon of Diamond Crystal weighs 2.8 grams,³ so the right amount of substitute depends on which kosher salt the recipe had in mind. After that, the choice depends on what the salt is doing: dissolving into food, clinging to meat before it cooks, or sitting on top for crunch.

Quick answer

How the ratios on this page are labeled

• Computed: based on a measurable physical relationship, with the source named.
• Attributed: a named source publishes this ratio. We quote it as theirs.
• Disputed: named sources give different answers to the same swap. We show each one and do not average them.
• Method: we found no published ratio. We give a direction and a cautious starting point, and say so.

Most numbers on this page are weights: grams per teaspoon measured by ATK or printed on Morton’s labels. The disagreements are between those weights and ATK’s rounder rule of thumb. Every starting point below is set at the lower figure, because salt is easy to add and hard to take out.

Why the brand on the box matters

The two kosher salts are made differently. Diamond Crystal forms hollow, pyramid-shaped crystals in brine heated and stirred in open pans; Morton’s salt comes from vacuum evaporators and is pressed through rollers into thin, dense flakes.³ That is why the same spoon holds such different weights.

Grams per teaspoon

ATK’s 2022 article rounds the two kosher figures to about 5 grams and 3 grams.⁸ We could not retrieve Diamond Crystal’s own figure from its maker.

Volume swaps: the sources disagree

ATK’s own weights agree with Morton’s chart on Morton (1¼), not with ATK’s rule (1½). We publish the disagreement rather than pick a winner. If a recipe gives salt in grams, weigh it; ATK also recommends weighing salt rather than measuring it by volume.⁸

If kosher salt is measured into a recipe

In doughs, batters, sauces, soups and brines the crystals dissolve, so their shape stops mattering and only the amount of salt counts.

1. Any salt, by weight

Ratio (Computed): Use the same weight. The Codex standard for food-grade salt requires at least 97% sodium chloride on a dry basis, whether the salt comes from the sea, rock deposits or brine,¹⁰ so equal weights of food-grade salts carry close to the same amount of salt. This is the only swap on the page that needs no judgment.

2. Table salt, fine sea salt or pickling salt, by the spoon

These are the fine salts most kitchens have. Morton’s chart treats its table salt, fine sea salt and canning and pickling salt as equal by volume, teaspoon for teaspoon, and says the chart applies when swapping one Morton product for another.⁹ Oklahoma State University Extension likewise notes that table salt has the same crystal size as canning and pickling salt.¹¹ Morton’s own labels put its fine sea salt a little lighter than its table salt, 1.4 grams against 1.5 grams per ¼ teaspoon.⁶⁴

Table salt usually carries an anticaking agent, and iodized table salt carries iodine: Morton’s iodized label lists calcium silicate, dextrose and potassium iodide.⁴ Neither changes the taste. ATK’s tasters found no detectable difference between iodized and noniodized salt.¹

Ratio (Disputed): Turned around to start from kosher salt, the table above gives these amounts of fine salt per teaspoon of kosher salt:

Start with ⅔ teaspoon of fine salt for each teaspoon of Morton, and a scant ½ teaspoon for each teaspoon of Diamond Crystal. If the recipe just says “kosher salt” and names no brand, use the Diamond Crystal figure: it is the lower one, and you can add the rest after tasting. These are starting points, not measured equivalents.

3. The other kosher brand

ATK says that when a recipe was written for Diamond Crystal and you are using Morton, you should decrease the volume by 25%.³ ATK’s own gram weights (2.8 ÷ 4.8) imply a cut of about 40%.³

Ratio (Disputed): For each teaspoon of Diamond Crystal, ATK’s rule gives ¾ teaspoon of Morton and its weights give a little under ⅗ teaspoon. Start with a generous ½ teaspoon of Morton. Going the other way, ATK’s 25% figure works out to 1⅓ teaspoons of Diamond Crystal per teaspoon of Morton, and the weights to about 1¾. Start at 1⅓.

If kosher salt is seasoning food before it cooks

Salting a steak, a chicken or a tray of vegetables before cooking is the classic kosher-salt job, because big crystals are easy to pinch and easy to see on the surface. That is common kitchen reasoning, not a tested finding. Morton suggests its kosher salt for brining poultry and for grilled meats.⁵ What you want instead is another coarse salt.

1. Coarse sea salt

Ratio (Attributed): Morton’s chart treats a teaspoon of its coarse sea salt as equal to a teaspoon of its table salt, and so to 1¼ teaspoons of its kosher salt.⁹ That works out to ⅘ teaspoon of Morton coarse sea salt per teaspoon of Morton kosher. It covers Morton’s products only. Other coarse sea salts vary, and we found no published weight for them. (Method) With another brand, start with about half the volume and add more.

2. Coarse Himalayan pink salt

Himalayan pink salt is mined rock salt, and commercial supplies come from Pakistan.¹² Its pink comes from traces of iron oxide.¹² It brings no nutritional advantage: a 2020 analysis of pink salts sold in Australia found that a 5-gram serving made no clinically significant contribution to nutrient intake.¹²

Ratio (Computed): Morton’s labels give 1.5 grams per ¼ teaspoon for its coarse Himalayan salt and 1.2 grams for its kosher salt,⁷⁵ so ⅘ teaspoon of the Himalayan salt matches the salt in a teaspoon of Morton kosher. Morton’s chart, which treats its Himalayan salt as equal to table salt by the teaspoon, gives the same answer.⁹ Against Diamond Crystal’s 2.8 grams,³ use a scant ½ teaspoon. This holds for Morton’s coarse Himalayan salt; other brands’ grinds differ.

3. Table salt, if nothing coarse is on hand

Ratio (Method): Use the fine-salt figures above (⅔ teaspoon per teaspoon of Morton, a scant ½ teaspoon per teaspoon of Diamond Crystal) and sprinkle from a height so it spreads. Fine grains are harder to see on the food, so it is easier to overdo; that is our kitchen judgment.

If kosher salt is finishing a dish

Some cooks scatter kosher salt over food just before serving for its crunch. ATK’s tasters preferred Diamond Crystal’s “delicate and fleeting crunch” to Morton’s harder grains.³ ATK recommends sea salts for this job, as finishing salts.¹

• Flaky sea salt, such as Maldon. Maldon’s thin pyramid flakes form at the surface of boiling seawater, shaped by surface tension, according to the producer’s account to Foodism.¹³
• Fleur de sel. At Guérande, on France’s Atlantic coast, fleur de sel forms as crystals floating in sheets on the surface of the salt pans and is skimmed off by hand; the specification allows up to 12% moisture, so it is damp rather than crisp.¹⁴
• Coarse sea salt or coarse Himalayan salt, for a harder crunch.

Ratio (Method): By the pinch, to taste. Finishing salt is never measured precisely, and no published weight exists for Maldon or fleur de sel that we found.

If kosher salt is going into a brine or pickle

For pickles, the National Center for Home Food Preservation recommends canning or pickling salt, and says flake salt is not recommended because its density varies.¹⁵ Kosher salt is not automatically additive-free: Morton’s lists yellow prussiate of soda as an anticaking agent, while ATK reports Diamond Crystal has none.⁵³ For a poultry or pork brine, any of the fine salts above works at the Disputed amounts given. For canning and fermented pickles, where the amount of salt matters for safety, see pickling salt substitutes, which covers Oklahoma State’s method of converting by weight.¹¹

Notes for every swap

• Sodium. Table salt, kosher salt and most sea salts are all about 40% sodium; a teaspoon of kosher salt holds less sodium only because fewer of its larger crystals fit in the spoon.¹⁶ Swapping salts does not change how much sodium a dish carries unless you change how much salt you use.
• Iodine. Kosher salt is not usually iodized.¹⁷ Swapping in iodized table salt adds iodine; swapping in sea salt or Himalayan salt does not.
• Dissolving. Kosher salt is much coarser than table salt and dissolves more slowly, Tufts notes.² A fine substitute dissolves faster, which helps in quick doughs and dressings.

What isn’t known

• Diamond Crystal’s own grams-per-teaspoon figure could not be retrieved from its maker, so its column rests on ATK’s measurement alone.
• ATK’s rule of thumb and ATK’s own weights disagree for Morton kosher salt, and nobody has published which one ATK’s recipes were developed with.
• No published weight per teaspoon was found for coarse sea salts in general, for Maldon or for fleur de sel. Swaps involving them are Method starting points.
• No sensory test compares kosher salt with any substitute as a surface seasoning for meat.

Related

• Kosher salt and cooking with kosher salt
• Kosher salt vs. table salt, kosher salt vs. sea salt and kosher salt vs. Himalayan salt
• Pickling salt vs. kosher salt, Maldon salt vs. kosher salt and fleur de sel vs. kosher salt
• Table salt, sea salt, pickling salt, Himalayan salt, Maldon sea salt and fleur de sel
• Sea salt substitutes, pickling salt substitutes and the best salt for cooking
• Overdid it? See too much salt.