Salt pairing

Perhaps my friends, you have been invited to a wine pairing dinner where each dish is accompanied by a particular wine and you will judge whether it complements each other. Your familiarity with different food and wine types helps you determine whether such wine and food pairing will enhance the dining experience.

Suppose you received an invite from Chef Jeremy Young of the International Culinary Arts Academy Cebu (email [email protected]) to a salt pairing dinner and you start asking what this is all about. How many types of salt do you really know? Often, the only salt you have seen are the ones that comes in small plastic bottles and those plastic-wrapped sea salt in grocery stores.

Many years ago, my father was experimenting to produce a Philippine breed of dairy cattle and we add sea salt to the feeds of these cows. Imported salt from China arrived and because the price was cheap, we used it. Nine months later, we encountered problems because the cows gave birth to a dead calf (congenital goiter). Excuse me, not all salts are created equal!

Salinas Food Inc. in Pangasinan – the the same manufacturer of FIDEL iodized salt – produces Aro-En Gourmet Salts (Aro-en means “to love”) that were used in the salt-pairing dinner.

The menu read as follows:

 1. US Diver Scallop Carpaccio, Aro-En Shio Salt

 2. Poached “Cage Free” Eggs with Asparagus & Bearnaise, Aro-En Mineral Salt

 3. Duck Liver with Congee, Aro-En Bitter Salt

 4. Tomato Sorbet with Black Pepper Tuile, Aro-En Sel Gris

 5. Salmon Mi Cuit, Salmon Clam Emulsion, Aro-En Fleur de Sel

 6. Margret de Canard with Citrus, Aro-En Confectioners Salt & Shio Salt

 7. US Angus Beef with Root Beer and Vanilla Potato Foam, Aro-En Flake Salt

 8. Salted French Macaroons with Smoked Salt, Dolce de Leche & Vanilla Ice Cream Pop, Aro-En Smoked  Salt

 9. Coffee, Aro-En Bitter Salt

Immediately, I saw a problem because my dining experiences have been influenced by the gourmet society, the La Chaine des Rotisseurs, where we always believe that the Chef is responsible for the salt and spices and nothing is added. Also, I was not familiar with the gourmet salts so I ask Chef Jeremy Young for regular salt to compare it with the Aro-En Salts (similar to a double-blind study).

First dish was the US Diver Scallop Carpaccio, Aro-En Shio Salt and I made two slices, paired each with the Shio Salt and the regular salt and I could not recognize the difference. The next two dishes were served; and again, honestly, I could not tell the variation.

It was only with Tomato Sorbet with Black Pepper Tuile with Aro-En Sel Gris that it produced the desired effects, making the taste of the sorbet wonderful and three times better than that of ordinary salt.

The next three dishes came; and again, I could not tell the difference among them.

The dessert was served. We did not add any salt because the French macaroons and the rest were cooked with the smoked salt and they were already extremely good. On the whole, all the dishes including the desserts in this institution had always been wonderful, based on the experience of your favorite food columnist, who’s been a regular guest for the last ten years.

Time for coffee. I was hesitant to add Aro-En Bitter Salt to the coffee, but the experiment had to be completed. I mixed ordinary salt in the second cup. Results showed that the 1st cup with the bitter salt made the coffee lesser bitter and the coffee in the 2nd cup was not only bitter and but also salty.