we once ate at a favorite restaurant that we knew as being very good and very consistent.

one day, though, everything was way, way too salty. it wasn't just us, we overheard other tables complain.

the owner/chef always comes out to talk with the patrons, and we usually have a nice chat. he's also an avid cyclist and had just finished something like a 100 mile afternoon workout.

he was so deplete after that, of course everything tasted great to him the more salt he added! but to the rest of us....

so I've always tended to pack as much of a flavor punch into what I cook as I can without salt. I always warn people they're going to need salt or soy sauce. What is amazing is how few take me up on that.

This is one way I disagree with Beard. While some things do taste like cardboard without added salt, like breads and cakes, savory fare can do without it if it's cleverly prepared.

In fact, the reason I don't eat out much is that all I can taste in a lot of places is the salt.

that was a coke head. he could not get enough salt.
damn near sunk the restaurant.

My husband (separated and later deceased,) while a good, spontaneous cook, ALWAYS added salt to his meals at the table, BEFORE tasting. (NOT when he cooked.)

He had been a heavy smoker. Related?

smoking kills the taste buds.

My grandmother made a dish with salt cod, which my aunt (then aged about nine) heavily salted before she had any. My grandmother insisted that she eat it all. It took her, I am told, three or four days. It cured her of that habit.

It's a King Lear kind of narrative.

An old king asks his three daughters how much they love him.

The first one answers "More than the world!"

The second one answers "More than my life!"

The third (and youngest) one answers "As fresh meat loves salt!"

The king has a fit and throws her out of the castle.

A long time passes, and the former princess has become a scullery maid but at night goes out to the local castle to party with the Prince.

He asks her to marry him and she accepts. She invites her father, the King, to the wedding. But she advises the cook not to put any salt in any of the dishes. The cook balks, but obeys.

The old king tries one dish after another. They all taste nasty. And he bursts into tears.

The newly married prince asks him what's wrong and the old king tells him about the third daughter and the salt response. And he ends with "And now I know that she loved me best and I'll never see her again!"

Whereupon the bride/daughter/princess reveals herself -- and they lived happily after.

from the garden she and Dad raised. She died of bladder cancer in 2001 and I don't know if there's any scientific correlation, but every jar of tomatoes she canned the year before she died was loaded with salt. She used the heat-pack method and added the salt to the entire pot of tomatoes. I noticed that she was oversalting when she cooked, but Dad never said a word. Then she got too sick to cook and died about 6 months later. When my husband and I were driving back home to NC after her funeral, we stopped for gas and heard that a plane had just hit the Pentagon. We were glued to the radio for the whole drive home.