Since recently i have to cook for myself and a lot of products mention i should boil some water with salt and when it boils add the product.
Why on earth do you have to add salt to the water?
Boiling things using salt
boilingsaltwater
Related Solutions
Some people say cold water boils faster than hot water, this is false, found here and here.
One reason might be (from the first link): "Some water heaters may introduce additional sediment into the water, giving you another reason to consider starting with cold—at least, if time is not of the essence."
Here is a report entitled "Change in sodium content of potato, pasta and rice with different cooking methods".
So the "scientific answer" is:
- The sodium content in pasta cooked with different levels of salt increased approximately linearly with the amount of salt added to the cooking water. Pasta cooked in 4g salt/100g raw took up on average 28 mg Na/100g whereas when cooked in 40g/100g raw this increased approximately 10 fold to 230 mg Na/100g.
HTH!
PS: This may help you forget the Na intake temporally
Best Answer
This is generally to season the thing being boiled whilst it is cooking. The salt will infiltrate the innards of the thing being cooked infusing it with some seasoning.
Try with something basic like pasta or rice to see the difference between cooking in plain water and cooking in salted water.
This quesion and this one might also provide some insight.