Salt: Grain of life, by Pierre Laszlo, Columbia University Press,
$22.95, £15.95 ISBN 0231121989
WHITE gold: this is how salt was seen, once. In fact, it’s only since the end
of the 19th century—when it became cheap and widely available—that
sodium chloride’s status has plummeted. Pierre Laszlo’s Salt takes us through
the astonishing history of this substance with lightness as well as
learning.
Laszlo reveals how salt rapidly became a coveted commodity soon after its
discovery. First valued as a preservative for food, particularly fish, it
gradually gained in importance as a spice, opening up long, sometimes
adventurous…
