Is supermarket salt saltier than artisan sea salt?

Is supermarket salt saltier than artisan sea salt? C. McNamara

Try saying that as Asher Keddie would have in Paper Giants. Several times. Salt is salt. Sodium chloride. It all came from the sea at one stage during the history of the earth. The very popular Himalayan salt, for example, comes from an old sea bed. The salt in the salt mines under Salzberg? Once a seabed. The salt on your salt and vinegar crisps? Was once in the sea. You cannot taste pure salt. It has to be in an aqueous solution. Saliva will do the job. Put a paper towel on your tongue to dry it and then try and taste some salt. You can't. Not until the salt is dissolved. Sprinkle some fine table salt on a slice of tomato and the juices will quickly dissolve and it will taste salty. Sprinkle on some coarse artisan Celtic sea salt for example and until the large crystals dissolve it won't taste salty. Fine pyramid-shaped crystals are very thin and will crunch in the mouth, dissolve and then taste salty. You also can't taste salt if it is bound up in a protein matrix like in bread. Bread can be saltier than a sausage but because the salt is caught up with the gluten it is not readily detected by the tongue.

I love the taste London water gives to black tea. How can I reproduce it. J. Hillel

Lock ins. Comedy clubs. Pints of beer. Hand-held showers in pink enamel baths. Scum on tea. Some random memories of London in 1992. I remember reading in an English newspaper that scientists thought the scum was caused by natural wax from the tea leaves. It turned out to be caused by calcium ions from the water reacting with the tea. Calcium carbonate is the source. Great beds of chalk, or calcium carbonate, underlie large parts of South East England resulting in slightly alkaline water. It makes the tea taste different. You could try a little chalk in your kettle but do as my pommie mate Max and his wife do and buy Taylor's Yorkshire Tea. It's almost as good as that real taste of English tea.

I have noticed that cloves of garlic are getting bigger and bigger. So how do I judge how much garlic to use in recipe these days? D. Cutts

Yes, I agree. And police are getting younger and the ads on TV are getting louder. Depending on variety of garlic, and when it is harvested, the cloves can be quite small to very large. In the past, when recipe testing, I have always allowed for just over half a teaspoon of finely chopped flesh to equal one clove. There is, however, the issue of pungency. Some larger cloves can be less aromatic and powerful so you may need to use more depending on your taste.

Have you got a vexing culinary question? Send them to Richard Cornish at: brainfood@richardcornish.com.au

Letters, corrections and complaints

Sorry to everyone who was offended by my reference to "bloody feijoa relish", I assure you I am in no way fruitiest and regret any upset caused. Thank you to the year 9 science student and the stadiums full of others who corrected me on using the word "bacteria" as singular when it is, of course, bacterium.