Pink salt contains sodium nitrate. Curing in pink salt uses a measured, known amount of sodium nitrate. Curing bacon without pink salt requires another source o

Pink salt contains sodium nitrate. Curing in pink salt uses a measured, known amount of sodium nitrate. Curing bacon without pink salt requires another source of sodium nitrate. By far the most common is celery powder, although celery seed is also used sometimes. Unfortunately, the amount of nitrates in celery varies quite a bit, so to make sure that your "uncured" bacon cures properly you need to use enough celery so that, in the worst case, there's enough nitrate -- which means that in the normal case, the nitrate levels end up much higher. If sodium nitrate is the content of pink salt that causes your headaches, one would expect a similar or greater amount of sodium nitrate in celery powder to cause similar symptoms.