On Oct 29, 8:34 am, Christine Dabney > wrote:
>
> You all are confusing food that is salty,with food that is seasoned.
> If it is seasoned properly, you won't think it is salty, just that the
> flavors are highlighted and that they "pop" out at you. {snip]

Correct. There are several different kinds of salting. The kind that
motivated the OP is basically chemical. Salt causes changes in how
things cook, not just how they taste. The reason you salt when you
sweat aromatics is that it facilitates/improves the softening/cooking
process. Salting pasta water and potato and vegetable-blanching is
because those are more efficient delivery systems. The reason you salt
stocks, soups and stews from the beginning is you want to induce
goodies and flavor to release from the meat/poultry/veggies and move
into the liquid. When you omit any of these uses of salt you're
simply settling for something less good than it could be. Not a big
deal, just flat, as you say, or dull.

> This is one reason that we say restaurant food tastes so good and say
> ours never tastes that good at home. Maybe they just season a bit
> differently than home cooks?
>
Salt and butter and heat are the three things restaurants most often
use to a greater degree than home cooks.

> Reading both Ruhlman, and Keller and quite a few other chefs...I am
> struck by how many say that learning to season properly is the one
> skill they say cooks should learn.
>
It's something that always demands attention. It's not infrequent for
a judge on Top Chef to tell a contestant that a dish was
underseasoned.

> A lot of you might be surprised how much proper seasoning can greatly
> improve your cooking. I really truly urge some of you to test this
> out instead of just adamantly saying no.

It's another of the lessons I learned from reading and watching Julia
Child. She often seasoned each or nearly each ingredient as she added
it to a dish. And she would comment as she did that "you can't catch
up later." If you season at each stage that needs it you seldom have
to add salt to the finished dish. If you fail to season as you go, no
amount of salt at the end will turn the dish into what it should
be. -aem