Salt: A World History
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | THE BOOK BEHIND THE VIRAL TIKTOK
One tiny rock. One epic history.
"A must-have for any serious cook or foodie."—Anthony Bourdain
"This is a "wow!" book: roving, startling, engaging.” —Washington Post
“Kurlansky finds the world in a grain of salt.”—New York Times Book Review
An unlikely world history from the bestselling author of Milk! and Cod
You’ll never look at salt the same way again. The only rock we eat, salt has shaped civilization from the very beginning, and its story is a glittering, often surprising part of the history of humankind. A substance so valuable it served as currency, salt has influenced the establishment of trade routes and cities, provoked and financed wars, secured empires, and inspired revolutions. Populated by colorful characters and filled with an unending series of fascinating details, Salt is a supremely entertaining, multi-layered masterpiece.
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Community Reviews
Chapters
PART ONE
A Discourse on Salt, Cadavers, and Pungent Sauces
CHAPTER ONE A Mandate of Salt
CHAPTER TWO Fish, Fowl, and Pharoahs
CHAPTER THREE Saltmen Hard as Codfish
CHAPTER FOUR Salt's Salad Days
CHAPTER FIVE Salting It Away in the Adriatic
CHAPTER SIX Two Ports and the Prosciutto in Between
PART TWO
The Glow of Herring and the Scent of Conquest
CHAPTER SEVEN Friday’s Salt
CHAPTER EIGHT A Nordic Dream
CHAPTER NINE A Well-Salted Hexagon
CHAPTER TEN The Hapsburg Pickle
CHAPTER ELEVEN The Leaving of Liverpool
CHAPTER TWELVE American Salt Wars
CHAPTER THIRTEEN Salt and Independence
CHAPTER FOURTEEN Liberté, Egalité, Tax Breaks
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Preserving Independence
CHAPTER SIXTEEN The War Between the Salts
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Red Salt
PART THREE
Sodium’s Perfect Marriage
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN The Odium of Sodium
CHAPTER NINETEEN The Mythology of Geology
CHAPTER TWENTY The Soil Never Sets On . . .
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Salt and the Great Soul
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO Not Looking Back
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE The Last Salt Days of Zigong
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR Ma, La, and Mao
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE More Salt than Fish
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Big Salt, Little Salt
My final opinion on the book
When a book has over 20 chapters I don't review single chapters one at a time. In this case it's a good thing because man this is a mess. It's a book about salt. So I figured it would be about salt history and salt production in different areas. That would have been a minor curiosity. Not an amazing topic, but could be fun as an audiobook with a few curious historical facts. Instead the topic is just salt in history. Any salt use in any culture is presented. Mostly he focuses on how different cultures used salt in specific dishes. So every chapter will have several pages just listing specific recipes. Often some specific meat dish. This is 20% a cookbook. Since there are no photos or videos of these dishes you are bored out of your mind listening to specific ingredients. It would be fun if I could cook these dishes in a group while watching a documentary on them or something. Or maybe some people enjoy seeing the histories behind some dishes. But on audio it just doesn't work whatsoever. It's boring.
Besides this miss the book is messy history wise. We just jump from culture to culture and there is no structured about how he talks about various cultures or what he focuses on. He is not biased and it's an impressive amount of facts. But as we jump to a new culture he may explain salt production, a dish, some capitalist in the industry. It's just a bunch of random mini facts and you have to adjust your focus to whatever the author throws at the page. Which is possible is you focus a lot and don't mind boring books. I personally like history books with a focused clear story going from A to B. I devour those books. I have read a ton of these history books that just collect a bunch of historical tales about a specific topic and they are all bad. Skip them. I don't really understand the point of this book. I do appreciate the work that went into it though. Main issue is that it's awfully boring and uninspiring. But also it just doesn't really try to explain salt production or salt consumption. It focuses on small stories from various cultures.
PART ONE
A Discourse on Salt, Cadavers, and Pungent Sauces
CHAPTER ONE A Mandate of Salt
CHAPTER TWO Fish, Fowl, and Pharoahs
CHAPTER THREE Saltmen Hard as Codfish
CHAPTER FOUR Salt's Salad Days
CHAPTER FIVE Salting It Away in the Adriatic
CHAPTER SIX Two Ports and the Prosciutto in Between
PART TWO
The Glow of Herring and the Scent of Conquest
CHAPTER SEVEN Friday’s Salt
CHAPTER EIGHT A Nordic Dream
CHAPTER NINE A Well-Salted Hexagon
CHAPTER TEN The Hapsburg Pickle
CHAPTER ELEVEN The Leaving of Liverpool
CHAPTER TWELVE American Salt Wars
CHAPTER THIRTEEN Salt and Independence
CHAPTER FOURTEEN Liberté, Egalité, Tax Breaks
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Preserving Independence
CHAPTER SIXTEEN The War Between the Salts
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Red Salt
PART THREE
Sodium’s Perfect Marriage
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN The Odium of Sodium
CHAPTER NINETEEN The Mythology of Geology
CHAPTER TWENTY The Soil Never Sets On . . .
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Salt and the Great Soul
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO Not Looking Back
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE The Last Salt Days of Zigong
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR Ma, La, and Mao
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE More Salt than Fish
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Big Salt, Little Salt
My final opinion on the book
When a book has over 20 chapters I don't review single chapters one at a time. In this case it's a good thing because man this is a mess. It's a book about salt. So I figured it would be about salt history and salt production in different areas. That would have been a minor curiosity. Not an amazing topic, but could be fun as an audiobook with a few curious historical facts. Instead the topic is just salt in history. Any salt use in any culture is presented. Mostly he focuses on how different cultures used salt in specific dishes. So every chapter will have several pages just listing specific recipes. Often some specific meat dish. This is 20% a cookbook. Since there are no photos or videos of these dishes you are bored out of your mind listening to specific ingredients. It would be fun if I could cook these dishes in a group while watching a documentary on them or something. Or maybe some people enjoy seeing the histories behind some dishes. But on audio it just doesn't work whatsoever. It's boring.
Besides this miss the book is messy history wise. We just jump from culture to culture and there is no structured about how he talks about various cultures or what he focuses on. He is not biased and it's an impressive amount of facts. But as we jump to a new culture he may explain salt production, a dish, some capitalist in the industry. It's just a bunch of random mini facts and you have to adjust your focus to whatever the author throws at the page. Which is possible is you focus a lot and don't mind boring books. I personally like history books with a focused clear story going from A to B. I devour those books. I have read a ton of these history books that just collect a bunch of historical tales about a specific topic and they are all bad. Skip them. I don't really understand the point of this book. I do appreciate the work that went into it though. Main issue is that it's awfully boring and uninspiring. But also it just doesn't really try to explain salt production or salt consumption. It focuses on small stories from various cultures.
Pretty boring, fairly disorganized, but occasionally has some interesting information. I love fish eggs of any kind so I kind of enjoyed that (very short) part in particular. If the apocalypse hits this book would probably be handy since we'll have to figure out how to obtain salt and keep food fresh all on our own. ;)
While full of interesting little facts, reading it leaves one feeling a bit unsatisfied with the book as a whole. Somehow it seems that there is, or should be, a bit more depth to some of the fact-ulites that would make for a more satisfying read. In the end, it comes across like having consumed a salty bag of chips, rather than a well-seasoned steak.
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