Fascinating facts about sugar and salt

Fascinating facts about sugar and salt

At different times in history, both sugar and salt were called “white gold” because they were so expensive and difficult to get. But there are many more interesting facts about sugar and salt…

1. Salt is used to make glass, laundry detergent, and paper.

2. Sugar really helps the medicine go down! It’s an important ingredient of many modern medicines.

3. Christopher Columbus introduced sugar to the New World in 1493, on his second voyage.

4. If you put sugar into a vase of flowers, the flowers last longer.

5. If you want to check if an egg is fresh, put it in a cup with water and salt. If the egg floats, it isn’t very fresh.

6. In the UK, there’s a club for people who collect the little packets of sugar you get when you order tea or coffee in a café or restaurant.

7. If your dog or cat has fleas, and they are now living in your rugs, put some salt on the rugs and leave it for 12 hours. This kills all the fleas. 

8. Only 6% of the salt used in the US is used in food; another 17% is used for de-icing roads in the winter months.

9. Sure and sugar are the only two words in the English language that begin with “s-u” and are pronounced “sh.”

10. Scientists use sugar to make different kinds of plastic, e.g., for food packaging.

11. Salt kills some bacteria, and so helps food to last longer, which is why cheese contains a lot.

12. If you eat too much salt (about one gram per kilogram of weight), you can die. This was a method of ritual suicide in ancient China.