Foods 2022, 11, 3120. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods11193120 www.mdpi.com/journal/foods Review Strategies to Reduce Salt Content and Its Effect on Food Characteristics and Acceptance: A Review Siti Nurmilah 1 , Yana Cahyana 1, *, Gemilang Lara Utama 1,2 and Abderrahmane Aït-Kaddour 3 1 Faculty of Agro-Industrial Technology, Universitas Padjadjaran, Jalan Raya Bandung-Sumedang Kilometer 21, Jatinangor 45363, Indonesia 2 Center for Environment and Sustainability Science, Universitas Padjadjaran, Jalan Sekeloa Selatan I No. 1, Bandung 40134, Indonesia 3 VetAgro Sup, INRAE (National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment), Université Clermont-Auvergne, 63370 Lempdes, France * Correspondence: y.cahyana@unpad.ac.id Abstract: Sodium is a necessary nutrient for regulating extracellular fluid and transferring mole- cules around cell membranes with essential functions. However, the prevalence of some diseases is related to unnecessary sodium intake. As a result, a particular problem for the food industry re- mains a matter of sodium content in foods. It is considered that customer acceptance is associated with salt perception dynamics related to the evolution of food production. It is a significant chal- lenge and technique to minimize the salt content of various foods and provide replacement products with substantial reductions in salt levels. This review summarizes salt reduction strategies related to health problems based on traditional review methodology, with practical and methodological screening performed to determine the appropriate reference sources. Various technological (salt re- placement, food reformulation, size and structural modifications, alternative processing, and cross- modal odor interaction) and behavioral strategies (memory process, gradual salt reduction, and swap) are identified in this work, including a deeper understanding of the principles for reducing sodium content in foods and their effect on food characteristics and potential opportunities for the food industry. Thereby, the food industry needs to find the proper combination of each strategy’s advantages and disadvantages to reduce salt consumption while maintaining product quality. Keywords: salt reduction; strategy; hypertension; salty food; low salt 1. Introduction Health authorities suggest that dietary salt should be gradually reduced because ex- cessive sodium intake causes many diseases. High salt intake is correlated with cerebro- vascular, heart disease, ventricular hypertrophy, kidney injury, and other damage to the target organs [1–4]. Salt contains 40% sodium and 60% chloride. Table salt provides ap- proximately 90% of the sodium in the diet [2]. About 75% of salt consumption (NaCl) comes from processed foods, not only for sensory but also for microbiological problems avoidance [4–7]. The World Health Organization (WHO) proposes to lower NaCl intake in targeted foods by 35% by 2025, such as bread, dairy products, soups, cheeses, meats, fish, and other foods. In most cases, sodium consumption is well above the recommended intake level. Therefore, reducing the amount of sodium intake in foods remains an essential concern for the food processing industry. However, in most countries, dietary salt consumption is well above the threshold level of <5 g/day, and salt restrictions on population consump- tion have been rated as one of the least expensive interventions to minimize cardiovascu- lar disease [8]. Several national salt reduction initiatives, including interventions in schools, workplaces, fast food chains or restaurants, hospitals, and government offices Citation: Nurmilah, S.; Cahyana, Y.; Utama, G.L.; Aït-Kaddour, A. Strategies to Reduce Salt Content and Its Effect on Food Characteristics and Acceptance: A Review. Foods 2022, 11, 3120. https://doi.org/10.3390/ foods11193120 Academic Editor: Cornelia Witthöft Received: 2 August 2022 Accepted: 30 September 2022 Published: 7 October 2022 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neu- tral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institu- tional affiliations. Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. Li- censee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and con- ditions of the Creative Commons At- tribution (CC BY) license (https://cre- ativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).