I love salt in any form. Ever since I did a super-detailed salt tasting at a food conference like 10 years ago I have been an annoying salt snob, evangelizing about fleur de sel across the land. But what is the difference between all the many salts out there? I was just at Whole Foods and they have a lot of crazy salts- black, pink, gray, you name it.

The SimpleHuman blog pointed me to has a cool salt primer with pictures, descriptions, and uses to help you sort through the salt heap... I highly recommend it. They don't cover all of the kinds you will find in the current marketplace, but I learned a thing or two myself!

To have a salt tasting yourself...

• get a couple kinds of salt, and definitely include the old Morton's iodized, fine sea salt, one of the colored salts, and a flaky clean salt like fleur de sel or Maldon flake.
• put them in containers with numbers, and have a key so you know what number is what salt.
• make people taste them without knowing what they are and with their eyes closed. ask them to let the salt sit on their tongue and have them think about what they are tasting.
• have the group share thoughts.
• this doesn't have to be planned. since I am always talking about salt, this often happens impromptu after dinner. It's fun and you will be surprised how different they are!
  

My favorite salts and their uses are...

• Maldon flake salt for everyday use
• fine sea salt (sel de mer) or velvet gray salt (sel gris) on buttered popcorn
• a big pinch of fleur de sel on top of a juicy piece o' meat
• black or pink flake salt sprinkled on top of a piece of grilled fish that's just been drizzled with extra virgin olive oil, just before serving
• coarse gray salt (sel gris) on raw fish