Of all the flavored Russian salts, I like this one best, even though it takes longest to bake. It takes its name from the monks who flavored their black salt with herbs from the monastery gardens. The salt is aromatic with dill and coriander, and a sprinkling of it on even the most mundane foods will greatly enliven them.
Recipe information
Yield
Makes about 3⁄4 cup
Ingredients
Preparation
Step 1
Preheat the oven to 500°F. In a small bowl, mix together the oats, salt, dill seed, and coriander seed. Pour the water over the mixture and stir. Let sit for 15 minutes while the oven is heating.
Step 2
Grease a small cast-iron pan with a very light film of oil. (I use a 5-inch long-handled blini pan for ease of removing from the oven.) Transfer the oat and salt mixture to the prepared pan. Bake for 2 hours, until the mixture has turned into a hard charred disk.
Step 3
Carefully remove the pan from the oven. Be prepared for a whoosh of smoke when you open the oven door. (I take the smoking pan right outside to let it cool, so I don’t set off our smoke detectors.)
Step 4
When the disk has cooled, lift it from the pan and break it into chunks with a mallet or meat tenderizer. (I find this easiest to accomplish in an old pan with sides so that bits of charred salt don’t fly all over the kitchen.)
Step 5
Transfer the chunks of salt to a mini food processor and grind to your preference, from medium-fine to fine. The salt can also be pounded the traditional way in a mortar with a pestle, but that’s much more laborious. In either case, it’s a good idea to sift the finished salt through a sieve to eliminate any lumps. Store in an airtight container for up to a year.
Reprinted with permission from Beyond the North Wind: Russia in Recipes and
Lore by Darra Goldstein, copyright © 2020. Published by Ten Speed Press, a division of Penguin Random House, Inc.
Buy the full book from Amazon or Bookshop.
