How much salt?!

[boxst]

For various reasons, I've had too much time on my hands recently so have been watching lots of cooking type programs (on YouTube mainly but 'proper' TV shows as well) and wow do they use a lot of seasoning. Without exaggeration probably 5-10 times the amount that I would use.

Am I just under-seasoning? No one complains or adds additional seasoning to the things I cook.

[soad]

Cooking salt is not something that I use often (even for boiled potatoes). Much prefer pink Himalayan rock salt.

Garlic salt works wonders for the sliced cucumbers though.

[Doofus]

I don't add salt to anything (occasionally a bit of mushroom ketchup or Worcestershire sauce). All the 'chefs' on PH will tell me I'm making bland, tasteless food, but I don't agree, nor do I care.

I use herbs and spices freely.

[Silvanus]

I tend to use a fair bit of salt and other seasonings, I have at least 6 different salts and plenty of salt based seasonings. One of my favourites at the moment is a blend of dried ground seaweeds (collected in Pembrokeshire) mixed with sea salt flakes. The right amount of salt acts as a good flavour enhancer, whereas too much will overpower, although it depends on what you are seasoning.

Tonight was a liberal sprinkling of rosemary and garlic smoked sea salt on crispy skin duck breasts. I don't think they would have been as good with a tiny shake of table salt.

[The Gauge]

Chefs seem to cook everything in huge amounts of butter and add huge amounts of salt.
Salt is a flavour enhancer so the trick must be to add as much as possible to enhance the flavours but without being able to taste the actual salt.

[soad]

[thebraketester]

If it doesn’t taste right it either needs more butter or more salt. It’s a killer in Indian cooking… you have to salt the st out of certain things to get them to taste as they should.

[Aunty Pasty]

soad said:

I think it's this. It's theatrics for TV. Sprinkling something on top of something else from high up always looks good and makes things seem better than they actually might be. It's the same reason that TV people pour cereal into a bowl from a height of three feet.

[normalbloke]

soad said:

If this chap came to my table for his theatrics, he’d leave with one arm less. That’s before the bill, obvs….

[kev b]

I cooked in a restaurant with an open kitchen, customers could watch us work, the most common comment was “wow thats a lot of salt!”

Edited by kev b on Monday 24th July 22:17

[dontlookdown]

I have two levels of seasoning when cooking. Day to day I keep salt and oil/butter to lower levels for the obvious health reasons. But when we are cooking for guests I will ramp it up to more like restaurant quantities, because it does make the food taste more special.

However even if salt wasn't bad for you, I couldn't eat food seasoned like that all the time anyway, it's too much.

[ralphrj]

There is a documentary series on Netflix called Salt Fat Acid Heat by Samin Nosrat that looks into the 4 elements that she says are the key to successful cooking.

The amount of salt she uses in cooking an Iranian rice dish has to be seen to be believed.

[bumskins]

Silvanus said:

One of my favourites at the moment is a blend of dried ground seaweeds (collected in Pembrokeshire) mixed with sea salt flakes. The right amount of salt acts as a good flavour enhancer, whereas too much will overpower, although it depends on what you are seasoning.

Good to know, seen one of my favourites down that way Cafe Mor have been doing something similar so will avail myself next time i'm down there

[boxst]

ralphrj said:

There is a documentary series on Netflix called Salt Fat Acid Heat by Samin Nosrat that looks into the 4 elements that she says are the key to successful cooking.

The amount of salt she uses in cooking an Iranian rice dish has to be seen to be believed.

Thank you, just watched it. The amount of salt on the cucumber salad was amazing.

[V8covin]

I don't even have salt on fish n chips so I wouldn't add it to food I'm preparing.
My mum used to add salt to everything

[bigandclever]

We all agree that any ahole that adds salt to something you've cooked for them before actually tasting it can be thrown out of the house, right?

[simon_harris]

Doofus said:

I don't add salt to anything (occasionally a bit of mushroom ketchup or Worcestershire sauce). All the 'chefs' on PH will tell me I'm making bland, tasteless food, but I don't agree, nor do I care.

I use herbs and spices freely.

Salt does more than just enhance flavour, it also can change the texture of foods (for the better or worse) draw out moisture and fats, it can act as a binder by helping produce protein gels.

[Kawasicki]

I intentionally upped my salt intake to help me stay hydrated - without the salt I end up with nasty headaches, I train a fair bit, even in hot weather. It’s like my cells won’t absorb water unless I have a fair amount of salt in my diet.

it’s a bonus that my food tastes better!

[Doofus]

simon_harris said:

Doofus said:

I don't add salt to anything (occasionally a bit of mushroom ketchup or Worcestershire sauce). All the 'chefs' on PH will tell me I'm making bland, tasteless food, but I don't agree, nor do I care.

I use herbs and spices freely.

Salt does more than just enhance flavour, it also can change the texture of foods (for the better or worse) draw out moisture and fats, it can act as a binder by helping produce protein gels.

None of which will enhance my enjoyment of my own cooking.

[anonymous-user]

soad said:

Cooking salt is not something that I use often (even for boiled potatoes).

Do you also enjoy burning money?