A teaspoon of salt here, a pinch or a gram here. There must be an easier way?
This simple technique will teach you to pinch salt more consistently and improve your seasoning, which is one of the most important aspects of all cookery.
It doesn’t particularly matter what type of salt you use, so long as you use the same one consistently. You obviously want to find one you like the taste of, so probably not the iodised varieties. Because different types and brands of salt have different densities, you would need to repeat this exercise if you change – but don’t worry, it only takes a few minutes.
Before we get started, we need to be clear what a pinch is. Your thumb and index finger together is a one finger pinch. Your thumb, index and middle finger is a two fingered pinch. A three fingered pinch is your thumb and first three fingers. The more fingers, the larger your grip and the more salt you will pinching.
Let’s do this!
You will Need:
Tare (clear) you scales and measure how much a 1-finger pinch weighs. Is is more or less than 1 gram? How about your 2-finger and 3-finger pinches?
Most people will find they are fairly close to 1 gram per finger. With a little practice, you can actually learn to accurately pinch a 1, 2 or 3 grams using the same number of fingers. If you weigh a teaspoon of salt, you can then figure out which combination of pinches you need to accurately measure that. If you need 5g, its a 3 and 2 finger pinch. 10g? three 3 and a 1 – simple!
Not only will this stop you reaching for the measuring spoons unnecessarily, but you will find that because your pinches are consistent, you will consistently cook better even without a recipe as you will be adding a consistent amount of salt.
Give it a try and let us know how you get on!