To wonder why no one seasons food anymore

Your daughter isn't "everyone".

Also, she's wrong about salt. Your body needs it (and it needs iodine, too, which is added to table salt in many countries).

Oh come off it...surely a mother and daughter can be natural with one another and not behave as if they're at some 1950s cocktail party!!

And when you see chefs on TV, the AMOUNT of salt they throw into boiling water or sauces....
Apparently that's why lots of food in high class restaurants tastes so good!!

As a pp said, salt is not bad for you, too much salt is bad for you.
I have to laugh at a poster saying they don't use salt but use soy sauce!

Compared to a single take away or ready meal or pack of crisps, or even a slice of sliced bread, a sprinkling of salt in a home cooked scratch meal is really not an issue. I don't put salt on the table as I will season the food as I cook it. My food does not taste salty. If you can taste salt then there is too much!

I use a huge range of herbs and spices alongside salt and pepper and cook from scratch every day.

I never realised that there was such a panic around salt and pepper that schools were banning even pepper from the kitchens. A bit OTT if you ask me but I learn something new from Mumsnet every day.

My mom cooked that way salt and pepper if yiu were lucky. Now I season everything and have a cupboard full of seasoning, spices and brings lol.

wow such a furore over salt!

I season food just not with salt unless its something like chips. I love pepper, I probably use far too much of that. Herbs are another thing I use a lot of. As someone else said most meat is quite salty by itself as is gravy if you use instant so salt really isn’t needed. I don’t season a joint of meat for a roast but I do add pepper to veg. I can’t say anyone has ever called my roasts tasteless including my salt loving son and he doesn’t add on.

This reminded me of my parents always bringing their own salt when they came for dinner with me when I was in early twenties 😂 it just had never occurred to me to add salt when i was happy with my food without it.

I’ve been put on a high salt diet by my cardiologist-that is, not just cooking with salt but actually lots of extra salt and ,potentially, salt pills-and I would really struggle in some your households, let alone the school “salt ban”. I would have to bring in a doctor’s note to be allowed salt on pain of fainting all the time!

Phew! Was so confused reading comment after comment saying 'well salt isn't good for you anyway' as if that all you use in seasoning?

I'm 54 and have never added any salt to anything I cook for my entire life. It's unhealthy and I have always thought so.

You're just accustomed to salty food so lightly seasoned food would be a bit tasteless to you. The way to overcome this is going cold turkey and letting your taste buds recover, then you taste the natural flavours of food. Herbs and spices taste better to me than salt.

It wouldn't cross my mind to put salt on an avocado. That's really weird to me.

Avocado spread on toast with a small drizzle of olive oil and salt makes a very tasty lunch!

Also find it funny that PP thinks having to use salt makes you a shit cook. I guess all the professional chefs out there are shit cooks too

The reason restaurant dishes taste great is because chefs layer salt across every part of their cooking to bring out each individual ingredients flavours, use fat and oil liberally, and balance flavours with acid and sometimes a small bit of sugar/sweetness. A "fantastic" spaghetti bolognese from your local Italian would be cooked in generous amounts of olive oil, with a bit of salt added to the onions while cooking, and also to the mince, and then also to the tomatoes (which is the acidic aspect of the dish). A bit of sugar would be added to balance the acidity of the tomatoes, either as a pinch of white sugar or as grated carrot for example

Sweet baked goods taste far better with a pinch of salt added as it balances the sweetness and makes it less likely that you'll end up with a sickly sweet dish. Most sweet recipes call for 1/4 or 1/2 a teaspoon of salt in the entire mixture (eg an average cake recipe), which is really a tiny amount of salt in the grand scheme of all the other ingredients!

Many people who say they don't cook with salt actually do cook with salt because they inadvertently introduce it through other means, eg they'll say "I never cook with salt, can't stand it!!" But then throw in half pack of bacon to the dish instead

Unless you have a health condition, there really is no reason to restrict salt beyond normal, sensible levels. Chugging and entire jar of salty anchovies daily isn't good for anyone, but unless you've got kidney issues or high BP, a bit of salt in your cooking really isn't a big deal. Salt being evil, the devil, will kill you etc is hyperbole. The same way fat free yoghurt only tastes good because its got a shit load of sugar in it, when in reality it'd be healthier to simply have the fat in the yoghurt in the first place than adding refined sugar to make it palatable

How old is your DD?

I think most people season their food.
It doesn’t need to be salt and pepper though.

My parents put salt and pepper on their roast after it’s cooked too but I always think that is overkill.

I have noticed this too, big reductions in cravings. I hardly ever eat crisps for instance as I just don’t have a craving for them.

I'm guessing people just weigh up whether they want salty food or to avoid a heart attack.

er there’s a middle ground between no salt & heart attack 😆

I don’t use salt often. Pepper sometimes but I’ll always have herbs and spices etc. you can season your food without salt and pepper there are other ways.

Generally I feel that if good food is well seasoned, it reduces the cravings and appeal of unhealthy snacks (crisps takeaways ready meals etc).
Nicer to eat an avocado with a little sea salt , lemon juice and pepper, than reach for a bag of crisps.

Yes, this! I gave up salt once quite a few years ago and very quickly felt like shit. I read up on how essential it is and what it does in the body, went back to it and never looked back. I love a wanky posh salt almost as much as a posh olive oil.

Thread has been interesting and may go some way to explaining why everyone who eats at ours raves about DH's cooking. He's a decent cook but not a chef or anything. Maybe they're all eating unsalted cooking at home and convincing themselves it tastes good.

No chef worth his salt would cook without it.

Always season food

I hate food that tastes salty. Just add it to your meal if you wanted it.

I don't add salt to the vast majority of things that I'm cooking, and definitely not if I'm roasting meat or cooking vegetables, although I add pepper to lots of things. I really don't think salt is necessary and I could never eat vegetables when my mum cooked them as they were always so salty. I also can't eat chips from places like McDonalds because they cover them in salt.

I’m 70 and never add salt to anything I cook. It’s on the table if people want it.