sour salt

4.8

Small white crystals that you add to food to make it taste sour

noun

: sal agria

You can use sour salt instead of lemon juice to provide acidity in baked goods.

Examples

In Eastern European cooking, sour salt is often added to borscht or preserves.
I added a pinch of sour salt to the recipe.
The recipe called for a pinch of sour salt to give the soup a tangy flavor.
Have you tried using sour salt in your cooking?
Many recipes call for sour salt to enhance the tangy flavor of the dish.
You can use sour salt as a substitute for lemon juice to add acidity to your cooking.
To make the sauce more flavorful, add a pinch of sour salt to the mixture.

Synonyms

citric acid

vssour salt

Specialized

1 3.4

A natural sour substance in lemons and other fruits that gives flavor and helps keep food fresh

is sold as crystals for seasoning to add sour taste to food

Surface Forms

sour salt singular

sour salts plural

Morphology

sour + salt

The compound is directly interpretable: 'sour' describes the taste quality and 'salt' signals a crystalline seasoning, so a learner who knows both words can infer it refers to a salt-like crystal used to add sourness (e.g., citric acid). This is a literal, descriptive formation rather than an idiom, so its meaning is readily accessible to a B1 learner.

Etymology

Sour salt comes from how the ingredient looks and tastes. The small crystals taste very sour and look like table salt, so cooks called it sour salt. That's why the name now means citric acid crystals used 'to add a sour taste' to food.