When to add salt to cooking water?


When to add salt to cooking water?
Is it better to salt cooking water, for vegetables for example, at the beginning when it is cold or when it boils?

I always heard that one should salt "after", when water is boiling, because if it is salted "before" it will take longer to boil.

True or false? Let's try the experiment...
153 K 4.1/5 (23 reviews)
Grade this recipe:
Keywords:
Last modified on: July 25th 2017
For this recipe: Comment Send to a friend Ask me a question Follow Printable Diaporama
Times for this recipe
Preparation: 2 min.
Cooking: 10 min.
All in all: 15 min.

Step by step recipe


Stage 1 - 2 min.
When to add salt to cooking water? : Stage 1
1 litre of water is put in a pan and 1 tbs coarse salt is added.

Stage 2 - 10 min.
When to add salt to cooking water? : Stage 2
The water temperature is measured in the same way, every minute, until it boils.

Stage 3
When to add salt to cooking water? : Stage 3
Let's compare times and temperatures in this diagram: the unsalted water in green, the salted water in red.

Conclusion

At the start of heating, the temperature of the salted water rises more slowly: after 3 minutes 30 seconds the unsalted water is already at 040°C (100°F), while salted water is still at 025°C (80°F).
But then the two catch up and they take the same time to reach 100°C (210°F).
Another point: it seems, but I'm not really adamant about it, that salted water starts to boil at a lower temperature than unsalted, i.e. around 90°C (190°F) rather than 100°C (210°F).
Other recipes you may also like
Chestnut cake
Chestnut cake
This delightful cake is doubly chestnutty: it contains chestnut flour, and sweet chestnut purée.
August 28th 2025351 K5 1 hour 15 min.
Nanou's chocolate cake
Nanou's chocolate cake
A moist melting cake, very very chocolaty...
June 22th 2013295 K4.6 1 hour 45 min.
Express apple tart
Express apple tart
A fine apple tart, very quick to make.
April 8th 2020381 K 24.6 55 min.
Passion fruit jellies
Passion fruit jellies
Usually to make fruit jellies or (fruit "paste"), it's like jam but you need to cook fruit pulp and sugar much longer. Unfortunately, this long cooking is bad for both vitamins and flavour. In this recipe we use a special jam gelling agent, to reduce cooking time as much as possible .
July 4th 2018346 K4 2 hours 30 min.
Artichoke hearts forestier
Artichoke hearts forestier
This recipe is not very complicated, but does involve some work: an artichoke heart with a layer of mushroom duxelle, a layer of fried bacon, topped with a poached egg and cream sauce. Everything can be prepared in advance (the day before for example), but the final assembly should be done just before serving.
May 10th 2023281 K5 1 hour 50 min.
News list of cooking-ez.com

Sign up to receive the latest recipes (next batch due to be sent on 2025-11-02)

*Your e-mail Your first name or nickname
I am not a leaving thing
Note: We'll never share your e-mail address with anyone else.
Post a comment or question
Posted by:
I am not a leaving thing

Follow this recipe
If you are interested in this recipe, you can "follow" it, by entering your email address here. You will then receive a notification immediately each time the recipe is modified or a new comment is added. Please note that you will need to confirm this following.
I am not a leaving thing
Note: We'll never share your e-mail address with anyone else.
Alternatively: you can subscribe to the mailing list of cooling-ez.com , you will receive a e-mail for each new recipe published on the site.

Back to top of page