You must make this now (fragrant Tuscan herb salt)

We just returned to Seattle after a month away. Most of the time was spent in Madison, Wis., but we drove there from Seattle, which means we spent four days in the car each way. I have lots of stuff to post (or not post) from our trip, but I want to start by sharing an amazing seasoning I learned about in the car on the drive back to Seattle. I have to say we didn't cook much — maybe not at all — in Madison. We ate out all the time with friends or just by ourselves, partly because we were lazy, and partly because it was so hot a lot of the time that cooking seemed too hard. I guess we didn't totally forget about cooking though, because on the car trip home we were listening to a podcast of The Splendid Table. The host, Lynne Rossetto Kaspar was talking to Sally Schneider about making herb salt, and as Ms. Schneider described her technique for crafting the salt, I could hardly sit still  — I wanted to make it right away.

As Ms. Schneider described the process of chopping garlic, kosher salt and herbs together, I could almost smell the aroma wafting through the car. I knew making herb salt was going to be a priority the minute we arrived home. As I type this, the aroma of the herbs and garlic is billowing around me as the mixture dries in a dish near the window in my work room. The fragrance is inspirational.

I'm not a big salt user, preferring to use minimal amounts to bring out flavor rather than impart a salty taste. My taste buds are used to little salt, and too much masks the flavor of food, in my opinion. The herb salt adds a new dimension of flavor without adding extra salt to a dish. It's so full of herbs and garlic, you can use less salt. For my herbs I used sage, rosemary, golden oregano, and tarragon, and I used the food processor method. I made half a recipe using 1/4 cup of kosher salt, two cloves of garlic and 1 cup of herbs.

I used the fragrant herb salt for the first time last night to add depth to a quinoa tabooli I was bringing to a potluck. (Couldn't wait for it to finish drying so I used it partly dry.) I cooked 2 cups of quinoa in 3-1/2 cups of water and broth. I didn't follow a recipe for the tabooli, just added the ingredients you'd expect to find, such as a large cucumber, a handful of chopped grape tomatoes, lemon juice from a large lemon, four chopped scallions, a handful of parsley and of mint, and a little olive oil, plus ingredients I felt like having, like raisins — and a teaspoon of herb salt. It was served on a large platter surrounded by stuffed grape leaves, tomatoes, olives, hummus and carrots, and was well-received.

Today, I had some leftover tabooli and olives for breakfast, and was amazed at how fantastic it tasted. I could really notice the herbal notes and I think it may have been the most delicious quinoa salad I've ever had.



If you would like to make herb salt, (and why wouldn't you?) here's a video of Sally Schneider telling you how. (If you could smell what I'm smelling right now, you'd make it immediately!) If you prefer to just read the recipe for Fragrant Tuscan Herb Salt, you can find it here. I suggest reading the recipe after watching the video to get the correct proportions of ingredients, because she makes a much smaller quantity in the video. Enjoy!

Note about salt: Different salts have different sodium contents by volume, so read the nutrition info on the package and compare. I know that kosher salt has less sodium by volume because of its large grain size, but I didn't realize how much variation there was among coarse salts in general. Kosher salt has the least sodium content by volume, but I found a very coarse sea salt with a comparable amount of sodium, and that's what I used. By volume, I mean when measured out by teaspoon rather than by weight. Kosher salt's large grains contain less sodium than fine salt when measured by volume. However, I found coarse sea salts that seemed to have the same grain size as kosher salt, but more sodium, even though all the measurements were the same (per 1/4 teaspoon).

Some comparisons of sodium per 1/4 teaspoon of salt: 
Diamond kosher salt = 280 mg
Lima Atlantic sea salt (coarse) = 330 mg
Selena Naturally light grey Celtic sea salt (coarse) = 410 mg
Morton fine sea salt = 560 mg