Giada De Laurentiis is known for creating mouthwatering Italian-inspired dishes like her lemon spaghetti and rigatoni with pork ragout. The celebrity chef is talented in presenting her recipes on shows like Food Network’s “Everyday Italian” in a way that is easy for home cooks to follow and make for themselves. Thankfully, De Laurentiisis is now letting us in on the three salts she keeps in rotation and can be used for a variety of meals.
In a TikTok, the cookbook author said she uses everyday salt that’s kosher, a flakey Maldon type, and a very fine version that has herbs in it. De Laurentiis explained she uses the everyday salt in practically everything. “I love the texture,” she revealed. “It’s not fine but it’s not coarse either.” As for the flakey Maldon salt, she uses that for finishing dishes and the very fine version with herbs is used to season her food before it’s cooked.
How each type of salt is different and what dishes shes uses them in
Giada De Laurentiis said she uses the everyday salt in everything from baking to pasta water. This kind has a fine texture, making it easy to mix in a variety of baked goods or meals. Adding sodium like this to your pot of boiling water with noodles is important because it adds flavor and lessens the chance for stickiness. This makes it the perfect type of salt to use in your saucepan if you are making a simple spaghetti carbonara recipe.
De Laurentiis explained that she uses the flakey Maldon salt for finishing dishes like a salad. This sodium variety has a less bitter taste than other versions, as well as a savory zing. The cooking host recommended using this ingredient on top of a Caprese salad to really make it pop.
The very fine version with herbs that the talented chef swears by is a Tuscan salt blend from Dario Cecchini. On her website Giadzy, it’s described as being a “blend of wild herbs and flowers combined with pure sea salt.” De Laurentiis said she loves the taste and smell of this one and suggested using to season seafood, meat, grilled, and roasted veggies. With these salt varieties in your cooking arsenal, you’ll be cooking like a professional chef in no time.
