The key phrase there is “to taste.” You add a baseline level of salt at the appropriate time (which is often but not always at the beginning), then adjust it at the end.
One reason you might use salt at the beginning is to pull moisture out of fruits like tomatoes or eggplant, or to push moisture into meats like chicken breast.
There is a very specific stage to frying potatoes or sautéing onions that I add salt specifically to pull the moisture out. I couldn’t articulate when this is. You just… know. Like half way through somewhere right after they sweat and before they begin to caramelize.
The key phrase there is “to taste.” You add a baseline level of salt at the appropriate time (which is often but not always at the beginning), then adjust it at the end.
One reason you might use salt at the beginning is to pull moisture out of fruits like tomatoes or eggplant, or to push moisture into meats like chicken breast.
There is a very specific stage to frying potatoes or sautéing onions that I add salt specifically to pull the moisture out. I couldn’t articulate when this is. You just… know. Like half way through somewhere right after they sweat and before they begin to caramelize.