Adding salt to coffee.

[Yelta]

Adding salt to coffee was mentioned in another thread.
I made this comment,
"Had a friend who always added salt to coffee, his family had migrated from Hungary after the Second World War, he said it was a family thing, his mother always added salt, perhaps to do with war time scarcity of food."
Turns out it had nothing to do with the war, more a traditional Hungarian thing, this thread makes interesting reading,

http://blog.khymos.org/2010/03/21/a-pinch-of-salt-for-your-coffee-sir/

Found this passage from the blog interesting,

"Bitterness is an important flavor in coffee, but under less-than-optimal extraction conditions it can be too dominant. Generally bitter tasting compounds are less water soluble than other coffee flavors, hence the bitter compounds are extracted towards the end of the brewing. High temperatures (close to boiling) and long extraction times also favor bitterness. In that respect the coffee percolator is known to produce rather bitter, over-extracted coffee due to near boiling temperatures, and such coffee would most likely benefit from a little salt! And before the percolator came the ground coffee was just put into the boiling water and then left to settle."
Might just give salt a try.

[Ronin]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

Its something my dad does also. Apparently it brings out the flavour of his instant coffee , but my coffee is to strong for him or so he says.

Not sure Ill try it tho as hes just had triple bypass heart surgery, so Im on a health kick now.

[Barry O'Speedwagon]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

As a teenager with a very teenage sense of humour (hasnt changed?) Id occasionally drop a teaspoon of salt into a randomly selected mates cup of (instant) coffee when it was my turn to make the round. Induced some interesting reactions (including my mum making me clean up the spray after someone took a large mouthful before sipping).

[Yelta]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

Tried it (salt) this morning in a long black, I normally use 3 grams of sugar, replaced the sugar with a pinch of salt, the result! bloody awful, not an experiment I will be repeating.
Well at least having tried it I can now speak with a little knowledge of the subject. :P

[Fresh_Coffee]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

Yes its an ethnic group thing.

Jon you probably added too much and this may be what is NOT MENTIONED (??? I wouldnt know as I didnt read the blog / topic). Add salt in a quantity that does not make the coffee detectably salty!

Then compare that to an exact replication of the cuppa that doesnt have the salt in, and see what you think

Ive had cafe owners doing that in the past and no one knew. But the cafe owners reckoned it enhanced their cuppas.

Whatever...its the same as the sugar discussion, the syrup discussion, the cardamon discussion, the black VS milk discussion, the auto VS conventional machine discussion......! You do whatever floats your boat!

[tim]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

Many many years ago when I was about 8 or so, I remember my Mum having a penchant for buying beans which she ground in the supermarket grinder you used to find on the coffee shelves of most supermarkets back then and making it in an old-fashioned "percolator" (the type with the little glass indicator dome at the top) and adding a pinch of salt and a pinch of mustard before closing the lid!
Although Id never do it now, for me, that was the first real ground coffee that I tasted and I have very fond and sentimental memories of this.

[Fresh_Coffee]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

........making it in an old-fashioned "percolator" (the type with the little glass indicator dome at the top) and adding a pinch of salt and a pinch of mustard before closing the lid!.......for me, that was the first real ground coffee that I tasted and I have very fond and sentimental memories of this.

And why not? I would be happy to give this a try to see what it does.......

Going to dig the old percolator out. I always see it when I dont need it, and it may well elude me now that I do want to use it.......

.....come to think of it, I think I have just remembered where it is

[BrandonS]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

Tried it (salt) this morning in a long black, I normally use 3 grams of sugar, replaced the sugar with a pinch of salt, the result! bloody awful, not an experiment I will be repeating.
Well at least having tried it I can now speak with a little knowledge of the subject. :P

I have a mate who introduced this to me a while ago. The amount of salt he put in was literally 2 or 3 (coarse) granules. He did it for the same reason; removing bitterness.

As to its effectiveness, well the coffee wasnt bad to begin with so I cant say. But it certainly didnt create an awful, salty flavour to the coffee.

If youre game, maybe its worth experimenting with a bit less?

[taco]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

I could see salt helping to bring out the flavour in coffee, but a pinch in a single cup would be way too much
Think more 0.1g than 3g.

[flynnaus]

Re: Adding salt to coffee.

In my younger days, the father of my then girlfriend served me a cup of instant with salt added. He swore by it. I swore at it! [smiley=thumbdown.gif]

Mind you, he was using Pablo or No Frills or some really crappy brand (no, now Ive reached CoffeeSnobdom, I dont know any really good brands ) and he made me up a cup without salt but I think it was probably better with it.