It is pretty obvious to our friends and family that Jordan and I like food. Because of this, we often receive specialty food products as gifts — hot sauce, candies, olive oils, that sort of thing. Thanks to our loving family and friends, our collection of one particular pantry staple outshines all the others … SALT!
Our friend Katie (art history buff turned pastry chef turned organic farmer—seriously, read her blog) was visiting a few weekends ago, and after a bit of good food and wine, we decided we ought to taste test our entire salt collection. It turned out to be a lot of salt. Friends and family, I think we are solid on fancy salts for a while.
Here are the results of our exhaustive sampling. Hopefully, this tongue numbing experience wasn’t in vain and these descriptions will be helpful in your next specialty salt purchase.
A note about our technique. We tried a pinch of each salt, and comparing against our baseline of kosher salt, made notes for each variety. It got rather silly after a point because well, salt is salty. A few salts received specific “awards”, a few were blessed with amazing quotes by Katie, all were salty.
The Salties, in alphabetical order
Black Diamond: Shock and Awe
Black, salty rocks. This salt is all about the spectacle.
Fleur de Sel: Most Classic
Straight up salt. Nice flake.
French Grey Sea Salt: #1 Finishing Salt
Mild, oceany and crunchy. “I like a wet salt” – K.L.N.
Hawaiian Sea Salt: Don’t Waste Your $$$
Basically kosher salt.
Kosher Salt (either Morton or Diamond Crystal): Best All-Purpose Salt
Size makes for even distribution, all purpose, super affordable
La Baleine French
What you think of when you think sea salt.
Lemon Flake
Amazingly lemony. It’s like a salt snack.
Malakai Guava Smoked Salt
Surprisingly mild smokey flavor. Add to homemade BBQ sauce.
Maldon
Slightly crunchy, very nice texture.
Meadow Sel Gris
Light texture, but a very substantial crystal. “It’s useless it is so big” – K.L.N.
Molokai Red: Most Surprising (in a Good Way)
Fruity at first, with a salty finish. Very crunchy. Would be great on roasted potatoes
Murray River
Light, snowflake-like texture. Very, very salty
Rosemary Salt
Wow! That is rosemary.
White Truffle Salt: Salt of the Gods
Hands down our favorite flavored salt. “This doesn’t even taste like salt. This tastes like food” – K.L.N.
A shout out goes to the tasters for their valiant efforts and also to our amazing friends and family who always seem to bring us back fabulous, salty presents.
-Emily
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