On air on Bayfm 99.9 community radio on September 26, 2011
At this year’s By ron Bay Writers Festival I interviewed the 2010 Masterchef winner, Adam Liaw. For those of you who never watch TV and managed to miss the whole Masterchef thing, he is a charming, obviously intelligent young man who looks like a very friendly samurai. He is of Chinese Malay heritage and spent several years living in Japan. He wants everyone to realise how simple Asian food is to make, and often just uses just salt as a seasoning, not dozens of obscure ingredients. So it is fitting that we started the show with Brad Sarson, a healthy salt enthusiast. Salt is the single most important seasoning in the world. Many roads started as ancient salt trade routes. Salt is at the origin of the very word for sauce, for salary (the money to buy salt), salt and bread mean hospitality in Russian, salt means intelligence and wit. And our bodies are a salty sea, our bodies have the same percentage of salt as the oceans.
Himalayan salt
ALL SALT IS SEA SALT…
was the most interesting thing I learned today. At one time all salt was sea water says Brad. We still get some straight from the sea, but some was deposited long ago and became solid crystals, with all sorts of interesting trace elements which colour it grey, yellow, brown – or a pretty pink, like Brad’s favourite salt, Himalayan. This salt was made when the biggest mountains in the world sat on top of an ancient sea for a few million years, trapping 84 minerals that our bodies need in its crystals. Brad and Jen Sarson run the Byron Bay Healthy Salt Company, go to their website for lots of information about salt in general and Himalayan crystal salt. All salts are definitely not the same. Basic cooking salt has been stripped of all trace elements, and has other chemicals added to keep it running freely. I don’t know enough to comment about the health claims for Brad’s salt, but it does taste good, and it is intensely salty, so you can use less. Most of the ‘gourmet’ salts do have a more interesting, balanced flavour than basic salt. Or maybe that is just my body recognising what it needs, the same way grazing animals look for salt to lick.
Brad was keen to share a healthy way to start the day.
HIMALAYAN SALT SOLUTION SOLE’ (stored sunlight)
Fill a jar that has a lid with mineral water.
Add Himalayan crystal salt to water and leave overnight.
If all the salt has dissolved add more salt and leave it overnight again.
When salt crystals are still visible it means no more can be absorbed, so the solution is saturated.
Have one teaspoon in the morning 20 to 30 minutes before food. It will gently start your digestion and has amazing health benefits.
Brad Sarson
ADAM LIAW AT THE BYRON BAY WRITERS FESTIVAL
Adam Liaw in his first cookbook, Two Asian Kitchens, is on a mission to get us all just having a go at Asian food. He told belly about summer fish and winter fish, the birthday cake with tomato sauce his father made him once, life after Masterchef and why there were so many lawyers on the show, among other things. The full interview is here, just click on the audio links below.
His favourite food is Hainanese chicken rice, and he does seem to love chooks and ducks. Here’s a bunch of links to his recipes.
SPICY GROUND CHICKEN AND RICE NOODLES
FRESH REPORT
Lots of lovely kale in the markets at good prices, try making a super healthy kale pesto. Strip out the central stalk and stick the raw leaves in afood processor with olive oil, toasted pinenuts (or macadamias), garlic, salt and parmesan. No need to use a mortar and pestle, the kale leaves can take it. Or try the same ingredients as a salad.
BELLY BULLETIN
Choice the consumer rights organisation would like our help. As part of a nationwide review of product labelling, it would like the government to introduce traffic light style labelling of fat, sugar and salt content, so we are no longer misled by products that claim to be healthy because they are very low in salt, for example, or have added fibre, while they are very high in sugar or fat.
This is the link to the Choice better labelling/shame the claim campaign
This is a direct link to some graphic examples of currently perfectly legal, but misleading claims.
EDIBLE QUOTES
It had to be about salt today. From wiccans to jews, hindus to catholics, most religions regard salt highly. The Christian apostle Paul, not someone I would quote much as he had rather old fashioned views about women, was a salt lover. He wrote : “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt”. But my favourite salty saying comes from the great prophet of Islam, Muhammad, who is reported to have said : “Salt is the master of your food. God sent down four blessings from the sky – fire, water, iron and salt”
Love and salty chocolate balls, sister T
MUSIC
MLK, Topology
Salt, Lizz Wright
Chocolate Salty Balls, South Park’s Chef
Funky Chicken, Rufus Thomas
Quan Yin’s cherry Blossom, Shanti family and Friends, from Buddha and Bonsai