Salty is not savory but you might think otherwise

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I was noticing and thinking about something earlier today when it comes to food. In a lot of foods, in our quest to cut calories and fat, we’ve substituted astonishing amounts of salt for savory, for flavor that originally came from modest amounts of fat. Take a look at bacon, for example. Salty, to be sure, but savory even more so, which means you need comparatively little to make up that savory flavor. Take the bacon out of the recipe, any recipe, and you find yourself dumping in heaps of salt.

What really brought this to mind was noticing that the sodium on a lot of foods was way higher than seemed reasonable, especially for prepared foods. When I cook meals at home, I use salt, sure, but I also use higher fat items like butter, bacon, etc. as well as other, more expensive seasonings like fresh garlic, onion, and herbs. Prepared, manufactured foods probably go the lowest cost route and just dump the salt in instead of richer, tastier, more costly ingredients.

In the coming year, as the economy continues to struggle, one of the best things in the world you can do for yourself is learn to cook reasonably well. Not gourmet, not master chef, just competent. Good enough so that when you go out for dinner, you’re more often than not disappointed, and the first thought on your mind is, “I could do this at home for half the cost and it’d taste better!” That’s when you’ve achieved competence. You’ll make tastier foods, you’ll save a ton of money, and you might even eat healthier, since 1 gram of bacon in place of 10 grams of salt is a fair trade.

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9 responses to “Salty is not savory but you might think otherwise”

December 14, 2008

justinlevy

I firmly agree. You'd think that since I own a restaurant that I'd be more likely to cook. Actually I LOVE cooking and can do it very well. But, I find that we quickly fall into traps of where it becomes “easier” to run out to get a meal even though it really isn't any faster…it actually probably takes even more time. Usually we pull ourselves out of the trap for a few weeks then fall right back into it the second we run out of groceries.

In '09 though, at least the first part of it, we will definitely be cooking at home a lot more because of a move to Boston next month, a vacation in March and a wedding in June 🙂

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December 14, 2008

justinlevy

I firmly agree. You'd think that since I own a restaurant that I'd be more likely to cook. Actually I LOVE cooking and can do it very well. But, I find that we quickly fall into traps of where it becomes “easier” to run out to get a meal even though it really isn't any faster…it actually probably takes even more time. Usually we pull ourselves out of the trap for a few weeks then fall right back into it the second we run out of groceries.

In '09 though, at least the first part of it, we will definitely be cooking at home a lot more because of a move to Boston next month, a vacation in March and a wedding in June 🙂

Reply
December 15, 2008

justinlevy

I totally agree! You’d think since I own a restaurant that this wouldn’t be a problem because I LOVE to cook. But, we inevitably fall into a trap where we convince ourselves that going out is easier and faster when in actuality, it really isn’t.

But in ’09 this is going to change because we will be moving to Boston next month, a vaca in March, and a wedding in June. I know, a great time to be doing all 3 especially in our current economy 🙂

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December 15, 2008

justinlevy

I firmly agree. You'd think that since I own a restaurant that I'd be more likely to cook. Actually I LOVE cooking and can do it very well. But, I find that we quickly fall into traps of where it becomes “easier” to run out to get a meal even though it really isn't any faster…it actually probably takes even more time. Usually we pull ourselves out of the trap for a few weeks then fall right back into it the second we run out of groceries.

In '09 though, at least the first part of it, we will definitely be cooking at home a lot more because of a move to Boston next month, a vacation in March and a wedding in June 🙂

Reply
December 15, 2008

justinlevy

I firmly agree. You’d think that since I own a restaurant that I’d be more likely to cook. Actually I LOVE cooking and can do it very well. But, I find that we quickly fall into traps of where it becomes “easier” to run out to get a meal even though it really isn’t any faster…it actually probably takes even more time. Usually we pull ourselves out of the trap for a few weeks then fall right back into it the second we run out of groceries.

In ’09 though, at least the first part of it, we will definitely be cooking at home a lot more because of a move to Boston next month, a vacation in March and a wedding in June 🙂

Reply
January 15, 2009

Foto-ru

I very much like to prepare and I approach to it as to art. By a trade I the photographer. At me the big collection of different seasonings and by means of it I can prepare excellent dishes, as at restaurant from the most usual and cheap products.

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January 26, 2009

healthy eating nutrition

Yes I can’t live without salt. My sister usually says, “pass the NaCl.” We went to my sisters house for a dinner one time and all of us were using their salt shaker (which was filled with salt) we kept adding more, someone finally discovered salt was not even coming out of it. My brother-in-law told us it was psychological salt.

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March 4, 2009

Chef Training

Very good point, I agree with you. We’ve sacrificed quite a lot in the name of healthy eating.

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March 9, 2009

Anonymous

Nice point….I am also amazed for the abusive amount of sodium you get on food bought at grocery stores and supermarkets. I do suffer from high blood pressure so I do check these levels often. My own theory for this pattern is because salt is the cheapest way to preserve food produced in market scales. Big companies do not care much about our health.
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