Making food taste..like it use too.

Soldato
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Serious discussion thread this. :D

Anyone remember back in the old days how much better Chicken & Mushroom Pot noodle tasted?

Its obvius they removed a lot of stuff,imo they are not all that nice now.

UNTIL..i remember someone mentioning its because they removed Celery salt.

So i thought id try this,Finally found some Celery salt at Morrisons and added half a tea spoon into the pot noodle..and it now tastes much better...like it use too.

So this gave me the idea,Anyone else know of any similar foods that dont taste like they use too but have little tricks to bring back that memory? :p
 
Oh god, they tasted foul and still do.

However due to the fight on animal fat most things taste worse, despite it being made up scaremongering.
Bring back tasty chips, bring back proper pre made pastry. Although occasionally you can get all butter.
And well everything else.
 
The chippy closest to my house is actually my favourite. My mate and his wife went on a mission to find out the best fish and chips in our town and I asked him the top 3, one of them being the local one that I liked. I compared it to his favourite and found the local to be superior.

Proper tatty chips, you can actually see their chipping machine through the frosted windows on the side off he store.
 
Pot Noodles are another one of those products that they have stripped all the salt out, too. I just added a little salt to a beef and tomato one and it was very much improved. I don't know what they've done to the chow mein flavour one though; I used to love them but they're disgusting now.

Angel Delight tastes exactly how I remember it though. Don't know what that bizarre concoction of chemicals in the ingredients are, but it still works :p
 
I'm with Jonny on this. A lot of processed food nowadays doesn't taste good because of some ridiculous, unfounded belief that all salt is bad. I never used to have to add salt to pot noodles or baked beans before, now I do. Having said all that, I rarely eat processed food nowadays as I'm trying to cut it out of my diet as much as possible (I do still have my guilty pleasures though :o).

Restaurants are the same - virtually zero seasoning added to food making it taste bland until salt is added. Salt is most effective as a flavouring if added during cooking, not after. Fine dining restaurants are better than others as they are more interested in serving tasty food than pandering to the anti salt brigade. I find, the more I pay for a meal, the less likely I am to have to add seasoning.

I don't blame the food manufacturers or the restaurants. I blame the brainwashed public who demand salt free food because they are told all salt is bad.

I didn't know about the celery salt in the pot noodle; I'll have to try that some time. I always have celery salt in the house for Bloody Marys anyway :p
 
It's an interesting one Stan - personally I'd much, much rather have no/low salt in any kind of ingredients I might use for cooking because then you always have the options of adding salt to taste at any point in the cooking process. A benefit of this approach is that often the Tesco 2-stripe/own brand versions of beans/tomatoes etc leave out the additional salt, MSG, yeast extract that I often find 'brand name' ingredients chuck in to boost their 'flavour' over the no-name stuff so it works out cheaper to get the stuff I like and would prefer to use.

Restaurants - fair enough, it's reasonable to expect a good amount of seasoning on your food and adding salt shouldn't really be necessary in most scenarios. I've found that since cooking almost entirely from scratch and not really adding much salt if any to most of my meals, that eating out it's really noticeable how much salt is used by restaurants in seasoning - not a bad thing as that mouth-watering-inducing taste is quite desirable but interesting all the same. :)

Pot Noodles are the kind of thing I imagine a splash of fish sauce would be a great addition for a salty savory flavour-bomb.
 
I find it really annoying that nothing has salt when you go out to eat. Its not always the case but most of the time it is. I add only a little salt at home though as my partner doesnt like it and add more for mine but having had meals with no salt (or anything else) at all makes me not want to go back to those places.

When it comes to stuff like noodles etc I dont know as I dont eat those pot noodles at all... But yeah I would imagine adding salt makes them better...
 
But do they cook them in dripping,

There really is no need you can cook perfectly good chips without and chip pies have been doing so for years!

On topic pot noodles are gash the taste has probably changed as they can no longer be 90% salt to make them addictive and mask the horrible taste!
 
I'm with Jonny on this. A lot of processed food nowadays doesn't taste good because of some ridiculous, unfounded belief that all salt is bad. I never used to have to add salt to pot noodles or baked beans before, now I do. Having said all that, I rarely eat processed food nowadays as I'm trying to cut it out of my diet as much as possible (I do still have my guilty pleasures though :o).

Restaurants are the same - virtually zero seasoning added to food making it taste bland until salt is added. Salt is most effective as a flavouring if added during cooking, not after. Fine dining restaurants are better than others as they are more interested in serving tasty food than pandering to the anti salt brigade. I find, the more I pay for a meal, the less likely I am to have to add seasoning.

I don't blame the food manufacturers or the restaurants. I blame the brainwashed public who demand salt free food because they are told all salt is bad.

I didn't know about the celery salt in the pot noodle; I'll have to try that some time. I always have celery salt in the house for Bloody Marys anyway :p

There is a difference between a little salt for seasoning and the vast quantities crammed needlessly into processed foods! Too much salt is bad for you and the invisible salt in processed food is a serious issue as the quantities are mad!

Can't say I've been to a restaurant where they don't season things properly, although a lot of it is down to what you used to if your used to heavily seasoned food then you will notice it more!
 
I don't mind a Pot Noodle here and there, but only the Beef and Tomato one, I usually add a bit of salt too, does anyone have a slice of bread and butter with one? I do it's lovely!
 
I put a few drops of Maggie's liquid seasoning in pot noodles to add a bit more flavour. Worcester sauce/ hendersons relish also works.

Never tastes anything like the old Golden Wonder potnoodles I remember though, sadly.

Speaking of pot noodles, a good few years back they brought out a product to rival super noodles. A block of dried noodles with a packet of powdered flavouring. I think they were called 'what? not in a pot? noodles' or something like that. They were pretty darn amazing, much better than super noodles. Haven't seen them for years, so i assume they have stopped making them :(.
 
There really is no need you can cook perfectly good chips without and chip pies have been doing so for years!

On topic pot noodles are gash the taste has probably changed as they can no longer be 90% salt to make them addictive and mask the horrible taste!

There really is need.
What's the title. Making food taste like it use to. That was drippings, and chips cooked in dripping taste far better than tasteless veg oil.

And agreed, what restaurants are you guys going to which dont season properly.
 
There is a difference between a little salt for seasoning and the vast quantities crammed needlessly into processed foods! Too much salt is bad for you and the invisible salt in processed food is a serious issue as the quantities are mad!

Can't say I've been to a restaurant where they don't season things properly, although a lot of it is down to what you used to if your used to heavily seasoned food then you will notice it more!

Added to that point the amount of junk food that is consumed by some in one sitting means that people are having huge intake of salt and other poor ingredients.
 
There really is no need you can cook perfectly good chips without and chip pies have been doing so for years!

On topic pot noodles are gash the taste has probably changed as they can no longer be 90% salt to make them addictive and mask the horrible taste!

Chip pies! There's a new one. To the kitchen!
 
pot noodles never tasted good.

and after hearing a few industrial engineers stories about what falls into the process in the factories i'll never eat them again anyway.
 
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