More salt is not needed for pleasure. This sea salt does.
The salt in the Queen’s household comes from the small town of Maldon on the coast of England. Perfect pure pleasure and therefore also the favorite salt of GloriousMe.
Salt in luggage
There is also a small travel pack for Maldon Salt, which comes from a small family business in Maldon, Essex County. Exaggerated? Not at all.
A plain breakfast egg in a jar, an excellent grilled piece of meat or fish, a sun-ripened tomato: There is nothing that the salt crystals from Maldon Salt would not perfectly round off.
Therefore, we can perfectly understand that salt lovers travel with the small, discreet Maldon salt box, so as not to have to give up the cherished taste of salt.
The typical (patented) salt crystals are gently rubbed between the fingers and are rewarded with pure pleasure. Who needs anti-caking agents or release agents in salt?
Faster than the queen
In 2010, Her Majesty, The Queen of England, visited the medium-sized family business. Two years later, she was obviously convinced and awarded the family business the royal coat of arms as a purveyor of salt to the court.
GloriousMe, with respect, was even faster in this respect. We have loved Maldon salt for over twenty years, ever since we first got to know and appreciate it in England.
At that time, we had to transport it to the continent in a suitcase, but now Maldon salt is also available outside England in many well-stocked grocery stores.
Less is more
The puristic salt taste perfectly accentuates any food. We therefore view salt mixtures rather skeptically. Herbs have the best aroma fresh and chili we like to preserve in the aroma elixir. We like flowers on callisons or in lavender sugar, but in salt they are superfluous from our point of view.
Salt needs nothing more than an excellent flavor of its own.
No rule without exception, due to sentimentality, there is still a second salt in our kitchen:
The salt on the skin
On a hot summer day, after swimming in the sea, feeling the salt still on your skin is one of the most beautiful summer pleasures.
Therefore, salt obtained from a salt garden by the sea is a beautiful souvenir, reminiscent of carefree summer days and guaranteed not to gather dust.
In our cooking water for pasta floats alternately a salt from Sicily, southern France, Portugal or Spain. The pack reminds us of wonderful days by the sea – especially this summer.
Places whose water has a high salt content along with other minerals were popular health resorts in earlier centuries.
Victor Hugo, Leo Tolstoy and Rimsky-Korsakov went to Beix-les-Bains in Switzerland to take the cure: in addition to the drinking halls and salt works, excellent restaurants and theaters provided variety. Today a rather sleepy place, salt is still mined there.
The salt from the Dead Sea is used therapeutically. Even without dermatological findings, taking a footbath is a small relaxing luxury that we all probably indulge in far too rarely.
The salt of the earth
For more than 40 years, Brazilian photographer Sebastião Salgado has documented wars, famines, natural disasters and working conditions that seem apocalyptic.
You may have in mind his images from a gold mine in Brazil, where thousands of people descend over two hundred meters on simple ladders and climb back up again, crowded together, hoping for a small piece of gold.
The mine no longer exists, it was flooded. Salgado’s pictures, you don’t forget once you’ve seen them.
Wim Wenders has made a documentary film about this fascinating photographer that is well worth seeing and is available as Video on Demand. The name of the film: The Salt of the Earth.
Bread and salt
The traditional gift for moving in is supposed to symbolize happiness in the new home. The bread stands for sufficient food and livelihood, the salt for the spice of life and prosperity.
Salt is important for the preservation of food. Therefore, the mining rights for salt, the duties levied on it and the trade in salt were historically of particular importance.
Salt was a precious commodity in earlier times.
To this day, there are salt mines in which salt is blasted and mined up to 300 meters below ground. Most of the salt mined in mines is processed industrially.
A major customer is the food industry, because salt is contained in almost all food products.
Late insight
Even if King Lear was initially disappointed by the answer of his favorite daughter, who, when asked how much she loved him, cited salt as a comparison.
The human body needs salt to function. Salt makes almost all food taste better. Not every cake has saffron, but each has a pinch of salt.
Top chefs let some sea salt trickle on many dishes at the end. We know from talking to some chefs that it is not uncommon to see the Maldon name on the salt container in their kitchens.
Her Majesty, The Queen, also received a gift of bread and salt at the opening of the British Embassy in Berlin. We hope it was Maldon salt, which has been harvested from the sea since 1822.
Worth his or her salt
The English phrase says it all: someone who knows their stuff and does their job well and deserves to be paid and/or praised; preferably both.
Roman soldiers received part of their pay as a salt depute. The English word salary is derived from it.
We hope someone praised you for your accomplishments today. If not, look back on the day with pride yourself, praise yourself, and treat yourself to a nice sundowner, perhaps a G&T, at closing time.
Photographs © GloriousMe
