This isn't a blog where we talk about food and drink (that's what Slashfood is for), but something happened on the most recent episode of Mad Men that I wanted to talk about. It was a shocking moment, something that a lot of people were talking about the next day.
Gene put salt on his ice cream!
Jason Kottke was interested in this too and decided to do a little investigating. Did people really put salt on their ice cream back in 1963 (or today), and if so, why? We all know that salt can make bland foods taste better, but it turns out that salt can make sub-par ice cream creamier and probably taste a little better too.
I shouldn't be so surprised by odd food combos though. When I was a kid I used to take slices of Wonder bread and pour sugar on them. Delicious! And I would eat Sara Lee pound cake not with milk but with Pepsi. Mmmmmmm. I also love peas but I hate pea soup.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
9-10-2009 @ 3:37PM
Steve said...
Ever hear of salted caramel ice cream? It is a popular flavor now in NYC. very good.
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9-10-2009 @ 3:45PM
jrm said...
I'll be honest, I do it, but not simply as straightforward as this. I stir up the ice cream (usually vanilla with chocolate sauce) into a smooth paste/soup-like thing. Then i add a dash of milk to keep it from being wholly solid and unmanageable and a little salt (sea salt to be precise) to liven up the flavor profile.
Of course, I also put ice on my milk, salt on my apples and brought saltines to the dining hall whenever they served lamb in order to partake in the ancient delicacy of mint jelly and crackers.
I am not a crackpot.
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9-10-2009 @ 9:52PM
Shanna McManaway said...
definetly salt on apples,cantaloupe,watermelon. i always used to take raw cabbage in my lunch for school.put a little salt on it-yummy!
9-10-2009 @ 3:50PM
Ace said...
My grandmother is a terrible cook, but the one thing she taught me that I swear by: If a dessert recipe doesn't call for a little bit of salt... you add a pinch or two regardless.
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9-10-2009 @ 3:53PM
amazo said...
this is not news.
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9-10-2009 @ 3:55PM
Joel Keller said...
It's not news; it's an observation on Bob's part. This whole site is about opinion and observation, even on the news stories of the day. And, yes, we even do posts on small aspects of episodes that just aired. We've done it since almost the beginning of our existence four years ago.
9-10-2009 @ 4:07PM
MJL said...
Wow Joel, why so defensive?
9-10-2009 @ 5:14PM
Joel Keller said...
Not defensive. Just correcting a misconception some people have about this site.
9-10-2009 @ 5:24PM
Laura said...
I'm glad Joel said something!!! i'm not tuning in to TV Squad for someone's 2 cents that isn't worth 2 cents...and in case it was missed, this is TV Squad - not TV news...
:) i love my TV Squad, can you tell?
And the salt thing was TOTALLY out of left field for me - but now that I read that it softens the ice cream, it makes total sense.
I too put sugar on sliced bread...was that weird? it sure was yummy!
9-10-2009 @ 3:57PM
XDXJX said...
i worked for a number of years at a homemade ice cream store and we put salt in the ice cream. i never thought anything of it.
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9-10-2009 @ 4:10PM
Kyle said...
I think it was used as foreshadowing. He couldn't really taste the ice cream, he was craving salt saying that he had a salt tooth, and was smelling oranges (or was it peaches? I can't remember.)
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9-10-2009 @ 4:19PM
nffcnnr said...
Oranges. Gene said something to the effect of, "This tastes like chocolate but smells like oranges." Sally said she didn't smell anything.
9-10-2009 @ 4:37PM
Dani said...
It appears that they are eating chocolate ice cream. A dash of salt enhances the flavor of chocolate. If you've tried making chocolate cake from scratch without salt, you can really taste the difference.
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9-10-2009 @ 4:43PM
Apostolica said...
Ever dip your salted french fries in a Wendy's Frosty? Awesome.
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9-10-2009 @ 5:41PM
The Deej said...
Not with a Frosty but I did it with McDonalds Chocolate shakes.
9-10-2009 @ 4:47PM
Jon said...
Madmenfootnotes.com says:
"Salt probably won’t make ice cream taste sweeter but will make it taste ice creamier, particularly if the ice cream is of low quality, as the store-bought variety might have been in 1963."
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9-10-2009 @ 4:48PM
Bertrand Russell said...
Ice cream is made with salt (it's an essential ingredient) so this isn't as strange as it seems.
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9-10-2009 @ 5:04PM
punksrus said...
My Dad loves chocolate cake with saltines. And we always put pepper on canteloupe. The worst is my husbands fav - a sardine with salsa sandwich on rye...yuck!
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9-16-2009 @ 10:41AM
stg said...
Yay!! I put pepper on cantaloupe too. I learned it from my aunt who was raised in Georgia. Nobody else I know does it.. it tastes great. Sorry to veer so wildly off topic.
9-10-2009 @ 5:47PM
Angie said...
I had and ice cream maker as a kid and you would put salt in w/the ice so that way the cream would stick to the churn as you rotated it. Sometimes, the ice cream had a faint taste of salt.
Also, the oranges thing... I read in an article that smelling oranges are part of the aura that signify when a person is getting close to having a stroke or a seizure. Just FYI
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