Just say no.

  It has to be said that your patience is highly commendable. Who knows how long ago it was that I was talking about flavours and how to add them by removing water? Anyway, picking up from where we left off with a look at actually adding flavour instead of removing water.

  Today a single element but one that could probably fill a weeks worth of blog posts. The subject, making food salty. Before you start giving me funny glances, this doesn't just mean adding a pinch of the white stuff. While a great source of saltiness, salt is definitely not the only option and the alternatives have many fine qualities.

Don't do it!

  Instead, think of salt as a neutral saltiness and a starting point. There are lots of choices available and funnily, as helpful as it may be for me to describe them, the best thing is for you to get your hands on as many of this list as possible and start experimenting. This way, when your dish needs that certain something, you'll know which to go for from experience. Kicking off this list is my personal favourite, ume. Buy this cheeky pink liquid first, I know you'll thank me.

  Ume is the liquid that comes from pickling umeboshi plums, (Sorry, what now? -Ed.), and has a very distinctive sour saltiness like a cross between lemon juice and salt. In fact, if you think that a dish needs a bit of both then ume is invariably the answer. It's quite strong so go easy with the stuff and despite being a Japanese ingredient, it seems to work with cuisine from everywhere in the world.

  Oh, knackers! I've run out of space so you'll have to wait until tomorrow to find out about more salty options, but until then I want you to think of what you might use if you ran out of salt and had to improvise. Answers to the usual address please, let's hear what you've got.

Kirk out

RevoltingFood.com