Unseasoned food

[ChangeAgainAgainAgain]

I've eaten at a few other people's houses in the last couple of months, and I've really noticed the absence of seasoning, and no salt or pepper mills on the table.

I grew up in the 80's, where salt was added in cooking to everything, so obviously it's great for health that we're no longer adding salt to vegetable water etc.

I don't generally add salt to cooking, but I always put salt and pepper mills on the table, and would generally add some to my plate.

I've recently been served meals such as grilled salmon, boiled baby potatoes, steamed veg, with no seasoning, no herbs, not even butter or EVOO on the potatoes. Or a roast dinner, no seasoning added in cooking at all, not even on the potatoes. No salt and pepper mills on the table. Honestly to me, these meals taste super bland.

Now, I'm an old fogie, and the people hosting me have been various ages, but all younger than me. Is this just how it is now? People's palates have changed?

So, AIBU to say that whilst not adding excessive salt in cooking is a great thing for health, it's normal/polite to have salt and pepper mills on the table?

IANBU - bring on the salt and pepper
IABU - times have changed. Cruet sets have no place in the modern world!

I used to work for a paediatric cardiologist. He said he often had children referred for unexplained fainting episodes, but it was usually caused by low sodium which he said was probably because salt is often not used in home cooked food anymore 🤷‍♀️

We are overweight and obese as a nation. Thats why we have hgh blood pressure and heart disease.

Maybe keep your own salt and pepper mill in your handbag or pocket for meals in future. And when you take them out to use on your food, offer them around to everyone else

YANBU, obviously.

We have massively cut down on the amount of salt we use in cooking, although we still use plenty of pepper, chilli & other spices. Salt is always available for those who want to add it, though. Maldon, of course, because we’re worth it.

Because we're kept so chronically short of salt and seasonings that any old shite from a packet tastes much better than a limp, watery plate of overboiled vegetables and some anaemic looking chicken breast.

Make decent ingredients taste good and there's no drive to seek out something that tastes of something.

My theory is that lots of people think home cooked food isn't very nice (because they don't season it) so they eat processed food and takeaways (which contain loads of fat and salt) instead.

I measured out a weeks worth of salt intake into a tub and it's a lot, I liberally salted my food and didn't use all of it for ages. I used to have near fainting episodes after exercise and salting my food stopped it.

I have heard multiple people complain that British salt isn't as salty as elsewhere so you have to use more. DP brings salt from Portugal!

Tbf, other people’s home cooked food IS fairly rank 😀

I agree with this. People do not season their food properly, you watch chefs on telly and they say 'a pinch' but what they actually put in is far more than 'a pinch'.

Restaurant food is like this which is why its so nice. I really upped my use of all seasonings many years ago, even spices in cakes where normally it asks for quarter of a tsp or half a tsp, I put much much more in.

My food is much better than anything I can buy and often much better than restaurant food. Layers of flavour. Fat is also necessary.

Mind blown.

You prefer bland food?

With your steamed fish and veg, do you not season it at all? Do you have any sauces with it?

Your post immediately made me think of Victoria Beckham’s alleged diet.

Do you like potatoes?

I think it is more that people don’t know how to use spices, so food doesn’t taste of anything but heat!

Also on my hit list is people that say 'spices' when they mean 'chillies' 😜

I use a lot, a LOT of herbs and spices but dont always use chillies and sometimes dont put much in if I do.

I often forget. We only use minimal salt but I use loads of pepper and herbs and spices.

but I forget done people like their salt and I forget to put it on the table.

just ask?

Doesn’t the food taste of food?

I really recommend Blackthorn salt.

I like my food to be well seasoned and cook daily with herbs and spices, unsalted potatoes are a complete abomination.

I’ll hold my hands up and say I’m remarkably slack the past few years re salt and pepper on the table because I have v young children (4yo and 1yo) who obviously can’t (or shouldn’t!) have much salt at all, and if the elder sees it, or more to the point sees someone else have it, he wants it too, so I don’t put it out and it doesn’t occur to me that others may want it!
With that being said, I do use seasoning generally, herbs, spices, etc etc. If anything, I lean towards the slightly too much side. It’s just personal tastes I guess isn’t it? What’s right for one won’t be right for another.

I do think it’s rude to add salt and pepper without even tasting the food but I always always have salt and pepper Mills out for every single meal because I love adding it myself. I season most dishes but I do Always add salt when cooking potatoes because I just think it adds something to them

Surely with a roast dinner the gravy is either full of flavour if it's home made or full of salt if it's not?
With grilled salmon and boiled potatoes I'd want butter which would be salty anyway.
We don't really add salt to meals because so often something in a meal, whether it's bread, a sauce, butter or processed meat, already contains salt.

No - it tastes of chilli so ironically you can’t really taste the food

That’s interesting. My mum complains that my husband and I don’t generally add salt to our food when cooking. She will quite pointedly ask for it in a way I find a bit rude. I think the thing is that if you’re not cooking with lots of salt you can taste the flavours of everything else in the meal and so it doesn’t feel bland to you.

Anyway, I digress. She did say she really hoped our child was getting some salt and as a result I have heeded her advice and he has good quality (but not low salt) ketchup, pasta cooked in salted water and other sources of salt. I’m glad I heeded her advice now!

I hope you are happy up there on your moral high ground.

Actually I did mean spices, not just chillis, but thank you for assuming I don’t know what I meant.

Spices overwhelm food and you can’t taste the actual food, I’m sure you will come back and say your use is subtle though.

Thats enough internet for me today. Who put 50p in the dickhead?

Only people who aren’t used to chilli find it masks the taste of other components!

Comment of the week 🤣

You used the word 'heat'.

Spices arent 'heat'. Apart from black pepper of course

Anything like chilli powder are from chillies, similarly a hot paprika.

My food has layers of flavour, the food itself, the interaction of the spices and herbs.

Some of us know how to cook!