Maldon Salt Substitutes, for Finishing and for Measuring

Out of Maldon? If the flakes are going on top of the food, use another flaky salt that crunches the same way. If they’re measured into a recipe and dissolve, you just need the same amount of salt, which is trickier to judge than it sounds: loose flakes hold less salt per spoon than fine salt does. Chemically, Maldon is ordinary salt, and America’s Test Kitchen notes that sea salts vary in color but only slightly in flavor.¹ On top of food, what you’re really replacing is the crunch.

Quick answer

How the ratios on this page are labeled

• Computed: based on a measurable physical relationship.
• Attributed: a named source publishes this ratio. We quote it as theirs.
• Disputed: named sources give different answers to the same swap. You get each one, side by side.
• Method: our starting point, based on how the two compare. Taste and adjust.

What makes Maldon different

Maldon is mostly about texture. Its maker talks up the flakes’ “fresh intensity and clean taste.”² Foodism, reporting from the saltworks, notes that the crystal’s thin pyramid shape affects how its flavor comes across.³ In practice the flakes give a light crunch and then dissolve, so the saltiness lands in small bursts. ATK recommends sea salts as finishing salts, scattered on food just before serving, not for cooking, where you lose the texture.¹

If Maldon is finishing a dish

1. Another flaky sea salt

Any salt sold as flakes does the same job. Anglesey sea salt, from the Menai Strait in Wales, is one with a published specification: its protected-origin rules describe it as crystalline white, flat, soft flakes.⁴ Flatter, softer flakes than Maldon’s pyramids give a gentler crunch. Store-brand flaky sea salts range from crisp to brittle.

Ratio (Method): By the pinch, the way you’d use Maldon, and taste. Crush larger flakes between your fingers for a finer sprinkle.

2. Fleur de sel

Fleur de sel also forms at the top of the brine. It isn’t dried like a flake; the Guérande specification allows up to 12% moisture.⁵ Expect finer, damp crystals that cling and dissolve a little more slowly, not Maldon’s dry, crisp flakes.

Ratio (Method): By the pinch, to taste. It’s especially good on sweets and delicate fish.

3. Diamond Crystal kosher salt

If all you’ve got is kosher salt, Diamond Crystal is the closer of the two big US brands. Its crystals are hollow pyramids, and ATK’s tasters preferred its “delicate and fleeting crunch” to Morton’s harder grains.⁶

Ratio (Method): By the pinch, to taste. Go lighter with Morton. ATK weighs a teaspoon of Morton at 4.8 grams against 2.8 grams for Diamond Crystal, so the same pinch carries more salt.⁶

4. Coarse sea salt or coarse Himalayan pink salt

These give a harder, chunkier crunch, better on a steak than a salad. Himalayan pink salt is mined rock salt, not sea salt.

Ratio (Method): By the pinch, with fewer crystals than you’d use of Maldon, since each piece is a bigger hit of salt.

If Maldon is measured into a recipe

Some recipes, often for bread, focaccia or cookies, measure Maldon into the dough. Once it dissolves, the flake shape doesn’t matter anymore.

By weight (Computed): Use the same weight of any food-grade salt. The Codex standard for food-grade salt requires at least 97% sodium chloride on a dry basis, whatever the source,⁷ so equal weights carry close to the same amount of salt.

By volume (Method): This is where Maldon swaps go wrong. Flakes pack loosely, so a teaspoon of flake salt holds less salt than a teaspoon of fine salt. The American Heart Association notes that large-crystal salts have less sodium per teaspoon simply because fewer crystals fit.⁸ Home-canning guidance from the National Center for Home Food Preservation doesn’t recommend flake salt at all, because its density varies.⁹ With no published weight for Maldon, start here:

All three rows hold the same amount of salt. The anchor, half a teaspoon of table salt, is a cautious place to start, not a measurement of Maldon. Taste where you can, and add more.

Notes for every swap

• Sodium. Table salt, kosher salt and most sea salts are all about 40% sodium,⁸ so swapping one for another won’t change your sodium intake unless you use less.
• Iodine. Noniodized sea salt gives you virtually no iodine, and the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements lists sea salt, kosher salt, Himalayan salt and fleur de sel among specialty salts that usually aren’t iodized.¹⁰ Swapping iodized table salt in for Maldon adds iodine. It won’t change the taste, since ATK’s tasters found no detectable difference between iodized and noniodized salt.¹
• Dissolving. Kosher salt is much coarser than table salt and dissolves more slowly, Tufts notes.¹¹ In a quick dough, a fine salt mixes in more evenly.

What isn’t known

• We didn’t find a published weight per teaspoon for Maldon, so every volume swap here is a starting point.
• Maldon’s maker doesn’t publish a composition analysis, and Maldon wasn’t among the salts in the analyses we reviewed.

Related

• Maldon sea salt, Maldon salt vs. kosher salt and fleur de sel vs. Maldon salt
• Fleur de sel, Anglesey sea salt, kosher salt, Himalayan salt, smoked sea salt and sea salt
• Fleur de sel substitutes, sea salt substitutes and kosher salt substitutes
• Cooking with sea salt and the best salt for cooking
• Overdid it? See too much sea salt.