More Himalayan Salt Tips and Ideas

• Arrange thinly sliced Carpaccio or sashimi on a cool salt platter and serve. Watch as the food literally salt-cures while at the table, gently cooking the edges and bringing on just a smidge of mineral-rich saltiness.

• Place a large tile of Himalayan salt under the broiler. Wait 30 minutes, then remove the tile with a kitchen glove. Set on trivet at table, and saute fish, meats, and veggies while your guests or family look on with awe, disbelief, and dawning admiration. While cooking, your food will take on a light saltiness. Note that The Meadow’s larger Himalayan salt tiles will often hold heat long enough for repeated grillings before needing to reheat, but that batches will be successively saltier.

• For an out-doorsy variation on the above, place a large platter of our Himalayan salt on the backyard grill, and plank grill a fennel-and-lemon stuffed monkfish, a lime-and-ginger marinated flank steak, or a balsamic and garlic rubbed Portobello mushroom.
  

• For a variation on the wilder side of the out-doorsy, do what our two boys clamor for day in, day out, day in, day out (be forewarned). Heat a large Himalayan salt platter on an outdoor gas grill (best) or an indoor gas stove (use extreme caution). Lightly butter the salt platter, toss on firm bananas, grill 20 seconds on each side. Turn off the grill (important), douse with grappa or bourbon, ignite with a long match, and watch the flambé! Blow out last flames and serve with scoop of vanilla bean ice cream.Barely salted and seductively caramelized, the bananas spring to life against the cool silken contrast of the ice cream.

More Salt Ideas and Recipes

1. Be sure the salt block is completely dry. If wet, allow to dry at least 14 hours in a warm, dry place before heating.
2. For gas ranges, place your Himalayan Salt Block on the burner over low flame. (For electric ranges, place a metal spacer—such as wok ring or pastry tin with a removable bottom—on the stove so that the Himalayan Salt Block is at least 1/2 inch above the heating element.)
3. After 20 minutes (allow more time for plates larger than 8" x 8" x 2"), increase heat to low-medium. After another 10 minutes, your salt plate will be hot enough to cook on. If extremely hot temperatures are desired, as for searing duck foie gras, or scallops increase flame to medium for another 15 minutes.
4. Verify the plate is hot enough by flicking a drop of water on top and noting a brisk sizzle.
5. Toss on the protein or vegetable of your choice. No seasoning necessary.

Himalayan Salt Plank Ideas

Easy Steps to Cooking on Himalayan Salt

Heating Himalayan salt slabs requires following some basic steps. Allow between 30 to 45 minutes to achieve the desired cooking temperature. Your Himalayan salt plate will crackle slightly while heating, especially the first time, as micro-fissures appear, giving the pink salt the elasticity it needs to expand as it increases in temperature.

Heating will change the appearance of your Himalayan Salt plate, so if you are in love with your salt plate just the way it is, you may wish to buy a different block especially for heating and cooking. We offer Cookware and Tableware Grades of Himalayan salt plates so you can have a beautifully fractured Tableware Grade salt plate for serving at room temperature or chilled, and a structurally robust Cookware Grade salt plate for cooking on.