Salt For Chocolate Olive Oil Mousse

Our answer

Nigella's Chocolate Olive Oil Mousse (from AT MY TABLE) uses flaky sea salt as a seasoning. The salt helps to bring out the rich flavour of the chocolate. Maldon salt is a very well-known flaky sea salt, from Maldon in Essex, that dissolves easily. The salt can be bought in the UK and in many stores overseas. It could be replaced with fine, free-flowing sea salt but you would need to use less as fine salt will measure very differently by weight vs volume. If using fine sea salt then we suggest using a half quantity, so 1/8 teaspoon and only a small pinch, for the recipe.

If you are sprinkling salt on top of the mousse then we would suggest only using the sea salt flakes, as they have a unique texture and crunch that will not be replicated by fine sea salt. Also in the recipe fleur de sel is not a great substitute as it has larger grains and will not dissolve as easily as sea salt flakes. However, you could use fleur de sel as a finishing salt for sprinkling over the mousse just before serving.