Being one of the younger smokin-joes on this forum, I tend to lean to YouTube for a lot of my entertainment and DIY projects or if I ever need to learn how to do something myself. 1 to 2 years ago I came across this video where this guy took just regular ocean water and boiled it down to make sea-salt which he could use for cooking.
*the channel is called TheKingofRandom, if you ever have time to just watch random videos, his channel is just full of a lot of interesting experiments and stuff. Sadly just the other week Grant Thompson, one of the main individuals/ founder that ran the channel was killed in a unfortunate paramotoring accident. He had a wife and family so how crazy it may sound but just watching some of the videos could actually help them out... since views= more ads, which more ads = more ad Revenue etc
Link to channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/01032010814
Link to Video:
But last year at the beach I forgot to gather up some ocean water, I bought the container but never did it. This year I made sure I remembered!
Science behind it: I'm sure everyone knows that ocean water is saltwater( if you didn't... well know you do lol), ocean water varies in salinity but on average its around 3.5%. This means that whatever amount of ocean water you gather, 3.5% of its overall weight can be contributed to by the salt that is dissolved in it.
I gathered roughly one gallon worth of water, so 3.5% of that gallon of seawater should be just salt. Fresh Water on average weights 8 - 8.33 lbs per gallon, seawater/ ocean water weights on average around 8.6 lbs once again depending on the salinity.
so, 3.5% * 8.6 = 0.301 lbs worth of salt in the water. 0.301 lb = 4.816 ounces, I should be able to get 4.816 ounces of salt from one gallon of seawater.
In comparison, the cheap salt shakers you get has about 3.75 oz of salt
shaker:
Process: I mean this is pretty self-explanatory, just evaporate the H20 from the saltwater
Here's some college level math... saltwater-water= salt
I've seen videos where people just let the water evaporate naturally by sitting it out in the Sun in pans but I'm impatient so I'm slowly boiling it away. One thing I didn't like how Grant did his is how hard he boiled it and water was spitting everywhere, So I have mine on a slow boil.
boil:
This was when I just put the water in the pot, so there isn't much boiling then but now it is going good.
this is the container I used to gather the water:
Dollar general special
So why am I doing this? well.... cause I wanted to. really that's it. Don't expect to get salt that tastes somehow better than all other salts( it might, maybe not) but it mainly is to have salt to cook with that you "made." Its just another element to add to your cooking that you can say, I made/gathered this salt that I'm using to cook with. Its kind of the same feeling that you get when you cook with stuff you grew in your garden or even food that you tracked down and harvested while hunting. It just adds that certain element to it.
My dad took on an assignment over in Germany and on one of the bases he would go to, there was a family owned Italian restaurant that he would go to offend and became friends with the owner. my dad asked him how he made such good food( I forget the exact plate but some Italian dish), The owner( in a deep Italian accent and hand gestures) said that if you love what you cook, it will always end up tasting good.
Making your own salt like this, just adds that extra element of love to your dish.
we all can agree that if we didn't love BBQ-ing/ smoking food.. 1. we wouldn't be doing it 2. it wouldn't turn out as good as it does. I mean 15+ hours for one piece of meat... I've see Kardashian relationships not last that long... but anyway I thought I would put this thread up cause I imagine some of you might find it interesting and may do it yourself.
I'll post pictures and amounts once its done evaporating!
- Smokinq13
*the channel is called TheKingofRandom, if you ever have time to just watch random videos, his channel is just full of a lot of interesting experiments and stuff. Sadly just the other week Grant Thompson, one of the main individuals/ founder that ran the channel was killed in a unfortunate paramotoring accident. He had a wife and family so how crazy it may sound but just watching some of the videos could actually help them out... since views= more ads, which more ads = more ad Revenue etc
Link to channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/01032010814
Link to Video:
But last year at the beach I forgot to gather up some ocean water, I bought the container but never did it. This year I made sure I remembered!
Science behind it: I'm sure everyone knows that ocean water is saltwater( if you didn't... well know you do lol), ocean water varies in salinity but on average its around 3.5%. This means that whatever amount of ocean water you gather, 3.5% of its overall weight can be contributed to by the salt that is dissolved in it.
I gathered roughly one gallon worth of water, so 3.5% of that gallon of seawater should be just salt. Fresh Water on average weights 8 - 8.33 lbs per gallon, seawater/ ocean water weights on average around 8.6 lbs once again depending on the salinity.
so, 3.5% * 8.6 = 0.301 lbs worth of salt in the water. 0.301 lb = 4.816 ounces, I should be able to get 4.816 ounces of salt from one gallon of seawater.
In comparison, the cheap salt shakers you get has about 3.75 oz of salt
shaker:
Process: I mean this is pretty self-explanatory, just evaporate the H20 from the saltwater
Here's some college level math... saltwater-water= salt
I've seen videos where people just let the water evaporate naturally by sitting it out in the Sun in pans but I'm impatient so I'm slowly boiling it away. One thing I didn't like how Grant did his is how hard he boiled it and water was spitting everywhere, So I have mine on a slow boil.
boil:
This was when I just put the water in the pot, so there isn't much boiling then but now it is going good.
this is the container I used to gather the water:
Dollar general special
So why am I doing this? well.... cause I wanted to. really that's it. Don't expect to get salt that tastes somehow better than all other salts( it might, maybe not) but it mainly is to have salt to cook with that you "made." Its just another element to add to your cooking that you can say, I made/gathered this salt that I'm using to cook with. Its kind of the same feeling that you get when you cook with stuff you grew in your garden or even food that you tracked down and harvested while hunting. It just adds that certain element to it.
My dad took on an assignment over in Germany and on one of the bases he would go to, there was a family owned Italian restaurant that he would go to offend and became friends with the owner. my dad asked him how he made such good food( I forget the exact plate but some Italian dish), The owner( in a deep Italian accent and hand gestures) said that if you love what you cook, it will always end up tasting good.
Making your own salt like this, just adds that extra element of love to your dish.
we all can agree that if we didn't love BBQ-ing/ smoking food.. 1. we wouldn't be doing it 2. it wouldn't turn out as good as it does. I mean 15+ hours for one piece of meat... I've see Kardashian relationships not last that long... but anyway I thought I would put this thread up cause I imagine some of you might find it interesting and may do it yourself.
I'll post pictures and amounts once its done evaporating!
- Smokinq13