How do you use salt?
 

With the recent reports on the overuse of salt in our diet, I started thinking about how I use salt when I cook and eat.
I usually don't add much salt when I cook and I keep an eye on salt content when I use prepared products. I don't regularly by low sodium products.
At the table, I add salt only to eggs, corn, and spinach, and occasionally chicken soup. Otherwise, very rarely, and I always taste first.
How about everybody out there? Taste first? Add salt to everything? Nothiing?

PP

I very rarely add salt to dishes...only when necessary, and then only in small amounts. I have become very conscious of my salt intake over the past few years, as I have discovered that salt does some pretty bad stuff to my body. (ie: water retention, blood pressure increases).
Worst of all, frozen processed foods. The sodium amounts in that stuff are absolutely hideous. Also, beware of "fat free" or "low fat" foods. Reading the label you will find that often as the fat decreases, the amount of salt increases.

I've been lucky in that I've never liked salt added on food. I may use it with a mix of other seasonings as a coating to cook something, but other then popcorn, I don't add salt to much else.

An unexpectedly interesting book: http://www.amazon.com/Salt-World-His.../dp/0142001619

Post cooking: Hard boiled eggs and corn on the cob. Very sparingly while preparing any cooked dishes.

Shoot...now I want corn-on-the-cob with salt and butter.

You will easily cut down on your sodium intake by using Lite Salt:
http://www.mortonsalt.com/products/f.../lite_salt.htm

To enhance the natural flavor of the dish/ingredients. NEVER as a main flavor.

I try to never use any salt, as I prefer pepper, or other healthier ingredients. However, if I need to add salt to a meal, I pour a bit on a spoon and carefully add it to my food. I don't empty a whole container of salt on my food, unlike some people I see in hotel restaurants...

My name is braslvr, and I'm a salt-oholic.:cool: I've loved and craved the stuff since I was a little kid. Food cooked by my parents rarely required additional salt, and neither does food cooked at our house, but that's because it was added during cooking. At most restaurants I have to use a lot, especially on meat, potatoes, cooked veggies, and eggs. For whatever reason, airline meals usually require very little if any. At 52 my BP is still 125 over 72 or less, same as when I was a teen. Salt is not bad for everyone, and it would be devastating for me to have to adhere to a true low sodium regimen. [shudder]

I add salt when cooking the meal and taste constantly. I never have salt on the table, in fact I don't own a salt cellar.
I never understand it in restaurants when people drown their food in salt before they even take a bite.

The only foods I cook regularly which requires me to use plenty of salt are; dried pasta - I add a few tablespoons of cheap sea salt to the water I boil it in and then pour it off.
Japanese style pickles (or any time I use raw cucumber, I slice it, scatter it with salt, let osmosis occur and rinse and drain the slices)
Japanese rice balls (onigiri). I wet my hands and rub them with salt before pressing hot rice with them (I have an ume infused salt for this, smoked sea salt is also good)

Usually I have regular Maldon Sea Salt to hand which allows me to be sparing with how much I use. It's rare for me to use more than a teaspoon when making food for 2 or 3 people. I'm not a huge salt user and even prefer my butter unsalted. I've found it really easy to make saltless, flavourful, umami packed dishes our baby can eat with us, we've hardly needed to adapt our diets at all.

My favourite way of using good sea salt is sprinkled lightly on watermelon.

I don't usually add any.. but I would just sprinkle evenly on the food.

That's sounds absolutely disgusting.

Will try it some time to verify. :)

Maybe it's not as nasty as it sounds...

I don't keep any salt in the house. When cooking, I might use other ingredients or condiments (which themselves contain some salt). For example, when grilling steaks, I'll use a little Worcestershire sauce and some low-sodium soy sauce, garlic and pepper, but never any directly-added salt.

My Dad did that. Cantaloupe too...

Ugh. I love grilled steaks and other meats, and eat them often year round, but I can't even fathom eating a grilled piece of any meat without plenty of salt. Brazil has it down perfectly.

Unfortunately I can't find the link/citation/article where I read this, but I did read somewhere years ago that the high altitude deadens your taste buds, and to compensate, airplane food is more heavily seasoned than regular food. Not completely sure how true this is across the board though!

I know that a lot of people agree with your preference. With me, as I've gotten older, my taste buds have become quite a bit more sensitive to salt. When I was younger (for example, eating Mom's cooking, who used salt) I didn't notice it as much.

^

I salt while cooking. I don't add much salt at the table, but I do go a little crazy with the pepper sometimes.

+1

I usually pour on the pepper, especially when I am having a steak. I find it interesting to see the expression from the waiter when they have been putting pepper on my food for more than 10-12 seconds!

I use a very little bit of salt when cooking. At the table I only add salt to eggs or to watermelon.

I get odd looks in the restaurant when I take the top of the pepper shaker and blacken my biscuits and gravy. Mmmmmmm.

1. Torturing gastropods
2. Brining ballyhoo for trolling
3. Melting ice on the sidewalk

Ditto but I'm curious if that's better or worse for intake.

Off the top of my head, my biggest uses of salt during cooking are:
Steak - dry rub (though, I've been using a worcestershire/soy sauce mix of late).
Scrambled eggs. Lawry's seasoning salt.
Mashed potatoes. I salt the heck out of the water I boil the potatoes in.

At the table
Usually just corn on the cob.

I've tried it on watermelon but it's a no go for me.

Provided the watermelon is sugar-sweet, it's da bomb. ^

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William R. Sanders
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Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

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watermelon and salt is AWESOME !! In fact, I am eating it just as I type.

I always taste before I add any spice to anything. Wife uses salt sparingly in the house...I can tell when she use a bit too much in the first bite.

I'll expand that statement to include salt AND pepper on all melons (incl. cantaloupe, honeydew, watermelon...)

I use salt only for cooking certain foods. I don't even own a saltshaker.
I generally just dive into the Kosher salt box for what I need. Foods which I make with salt include: pasta boiling water, mashed potatoes, roast vegetables (roll them around in a little salt and olive oil), marinara sauce. I tend to use a lot of black pepper and fresh herbs as seasonings.

having been raised with butter & salt when having corn on the cob, corn on the cob was pretty much my lone time I abused butter & salt. After discovering that when corn is in season & sweet, IMO it doesn't need any salt or butter, I've dispensed with both. I now & then rub a slice of lime on my corn on the cob, DELICIOUS.^

Seeing as I do all the cooking in our house, I do not add salt to anything, except when having a pork or lamb roast.

The predominant reason I use salt is either to assist boiling or to make a brine.

ditto

Great minds think alike;) I also never put salt on corn on the cob, as I only buy corn at the Santa Monica Farmer's market, and that corn was picked probably the day before. I am definitely going to try your lime suggestion. That sounds so good. The first corn of the season just arrived this weekend and it was so sweet, it could be eaten raw.

I generally don't put anything on my corn either .. but I'm going to have to try the lime thing too.

So I tried salted watermelon.

As anticipated, it sucks. Watermelon just doesn't have the legs to hold up to salt.

Now: take a mango, add some lime, salt and hot chilis - there is a fruit that can hold its own.

I used to put salt on potatoes and eggs and on anything that was bland including bad pizza. A few years ago I resolved to try and eat healthier and one of the things I did was switch from using table salt to using liberal amounts of pepper. It seems to have worked as I lost weight.

Personally, I wouldn't touch watermelon until July.

A tiny sprinkle of salt can make a tasteless watermelon palatable but it works its magic on already great tasting watermelons (which always has seeds) in season.

Now I'll have to try that, too.

Recently, a server decided to just leave the pepper grinder on my table. :D

Foods that have to have salt:
*Fried or Hard Boiled eggs
*Cantaloupe
*Watermelon
*Apple Slices
*Beer, sprinkled on foam
*Margarita on glass rim
*Bloody Mary with Celery Salt
*Popcorn
*Corn on the cob
*Fresh sliced tomatos with red onion slices and lime juice

Now wheres the topic: Foods you keep a can of bacon grease on the stove for cooking for!

duplicate

Recently I stopped using table salt and started using sea salt for everything, including boiling pasta. Food just tastes better cooked with sea salt.

What drives me crazy is when people leave the salt out of baked goods and other "sweet" products. It doesn't take more than a pinch, but baked goods without any salt just taste flat. Even something like icing needs just a tiny bit of salt.

Primarily to make sure no crops will ever grow on the land of my enemies, but also occasionally on food.