i heart yum » Product Review

SALT… what makes food taste goooood.

Gwen — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 07:07:00 +0000

This is a post I’ve wanted to do ever since Melissa’s amazing salt-crusted steak post. Yay procrastination! This is a little ode to one of the most underrated ingredients that shows up in literally every recipe. So here it is: a semi-brief, thoroughly-illustrated run through of the salts that I think every great home cook should have on hand and, most importantly, their uses.

There are 4 salts that I like to have in my pantry at all times: iodized salt, kosher salt, course sea salt, and finishing salt. These cover most everyday Western culinary endeavors a home cook would undertake (for eastern Asian dishes we rely on a stock of soy sauces and fish sauces… alas, another post). Let’s start at the beginning, shall we?

First off is iodized table salt.

Yep, that’s right. And who can say no to Morton’s umbrella girl? It’s a classic. But despite its all-around table salt persona, I only keep this around for baking. The minute and evenly shaped crystal size is perfect for distributing through batter, however it has a more acute flavor than other salts, so I tend to add slightly less then what the baking recipe calls for. So why is it call iodized? Cause in the 1920s they added iodine to prevent a rampage of goiter caused by iodine deficiency. Gross.

Next up is kosher salt, the salt I use 95% of the time in my kitchen. Perhaps that’s why it comes in such a big box?

Pictured here is also Morton brand, however I much prefer Diamond Crystal (seen here in Melissa’s steakum pic). In general, kosher salt crystals are larger, yet beautifully uniform bricks. I find Diamond Crystal’s kosher salt exceptional in texture — it’s flakier and easier to break up between your fingertips while sprinkling. This is truly my all purpose salt and I always have it in an easy access dish by my stove. Any dish I’m cooking on the stovetop, any dressings or sauces, any brines or marinades, any slow-cooked dish or roasted item… its in there. By default, I prefer it to be in a portion of the dish that will be cooked, as the kosher salt breaks down extremely quickly with a little heat. If you’re still cooking with iodized salt, please, please give kosher a try. It’ll take a little practice learning to use the right amount since it has a lower salinity than table salt, but you will notice the significant change in quality of your dishes. Oh, btw, despite the Star of David on the box, almost all salts are kosher according to the Jewish rules. It’s just called kosher because there’s no additives, like iodine.

Onto the course sea salt!

A while ago, I was told a story about a little old Italian grandma who swore that to boil a good pasta, the water must have the same salinity as the Dead Sea. Ok, so I got a C in chemistry and I’m not going to pretend to know what the ratio of salt content is in sea water, but I did start adding extra salt ( about 2 -3 times what I originally thought was enough) to the water… and it did make a difference. The pasta had more presence. So I tried it when I boiled potatoes for making mashed potatoes. And again, it made every bite perfectly seasoned. You could use kosher for this method, but I’ve really found that the closest my pot of water can get to tasting like the Dead Sea is with a very hard, course sea salt. I personally think it’s way too hard and inconsistently shaped to use in other cooking methods — it really needs a good stew in hot water to disperse all its salty goodness evenly. Plus, it’s really not an expensive investment (I don’t even know what brand this is, I got it at the local megamart) and this container has lasted me almost a year now.

And finally, for that perfect last touch, finishing salt!

For finishing, I always turn to Maldon Sea Salt, known for it’s beautiful flakiness and giant pyramid-shaped crystals (like the one next to the penny). This is made in Maldon, England using evaporated water from the local estuary. It has a deep, rich salt flavor with a higher salinity than most other salts, so a little goes a long way. It also happens to be Nigella Lawson’s favorite salt, so you can’t go wrong there, can you? If I could afford it, I would probably use it more like kosher salt (Nigella sprinkles it on her famous roast chickens, for example), but for now I use it strictly on a dish I’m not cooking, like a salad or carpaccio, or as just a final sprinkle on a cooked dish before serving. It’s especially lovely on fresh sliced tomatoes or caprese salad. There are a lot of high-end finishing salts, such as gray salt or pink Himalayan salt, but I’ll be sticking with my Maldon, thanks.

So there you are. Whew, a bit long winded, but I hope I helped illuminate some of the grand possibilities of our little salty friend… er. salt. Now go and stock your pantries!!

Vanilla Bean Paste: Nectar of the Gods!!

Melissa — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 23:50:00 +0000

It’s product review time, bitches! In this Very Special Episode, I’m going to introduce to you my best friend, Vanilla Bean Paste. Say hullo, Vanilla Bean Paste! Also Random Capitalizations!

I stumbled across my new BFF while perusing an aisle at Surfas, my friendly neighborhood kitchen supply shop. I’m sure most food oriented people already knew of this marvel, but I am but an esoteric ingredient virgin. So I pick up some and proceed to love it forever. Why is it so awesome you ask? Because it prevents me from having to spend all my monies on ridiculously expensive vanilla beans when I want some of that tell-tell vanilla tiny black speck stuff to show up in my sweets. And to me, it’s just not really vanilla without the specks.

Also, One vanilla bean = $12. One jar of vanilla bean paste = $9, which contains the contents of like, hundreds of vanilla beans! It’s all about value, my friends!

The product itself is like a syrupy vanilla extract with the innards of a vanilla bean thrown in. Substituting this for vanilla bean or vanilla extract could slightly throw off the moisture balance of your recipe, so keep that in mind for fiddly baked goods. Unfortunately, you prolly can’t find this in a normal supermarket, unless it’s awesome. So order off the internet or go to a specialty store.

Get some! It’s like vanilla flavored crack!

A tiny post on one of the best things ever.

Melissa — Sun, 18 May 2008 16:08:00 +0000

Gwen’s most excellent cooking school post reminded me of a tiny post I wanted to make about soy sauce. More specifically, my favorite type of soy sauce ever!

This, my friends, is usukuchi shoyu. If you ever have the opportunity to purchase this fine condiment, do so with great haste. I find myself reaching for this more than normal soy sauce in my kitchen.

I’ll steal an excerpt from the awesome tome “The Japanese Kitchen” by Hiroko Shimbo for an explanation. (Also, I will totally be reviewing this book at a later date. )

“The second kind of soy sauce is usukuchi shoyu, “light-colored soy sauce”. To produce light-colored shoyu, the wheat is more lightly roasted, and more salt is added to slow the fermentation. A small amount of mirin, or sweet rice wine, may also be added. The resulting shoyu is lighter in color, less strongly flavored, and slightly higher in salt content than regular shoyu, about 19 percent. Because of these characteristics, usukuchi shoyu is used in recipes when a refined color and weak flavor are required.”

I tend to prefer this sauce because it has a more delicate flavor than regular soy sauce, which sometimes is a little too strong for the presence I want it to have in dishes. However, use a light hand with it, because of the higher salt content. It will make your dish taste like you dumped a pound of kosher salt in there if you’re not careful.

Don’t confuse this with half salt or “light” soy sauce. Totally not the same thing, and frankly the “light” stuff should probably be disposed of in some sort of elaborate exorcism ritual. As with all soy sauce, pick one where the ingredients list reads something like “soybeans, water”. No high fructose corn syrup or MSG is needed or wanted.

(Also, if you’re an American whitey like myself with no proper manners, this stuff is awesome poured over plain white rice. But don’t tell anyone I told you to do it. It’s our little secret. )