How does salt bring out the flavor of food?
In: Chemistry
In the simplest form, it reduces the water content, which allows you to taste more of the actual food. Water is very good a diluting pretty much everything, flavor included. So, you add some salt and it mixes with the water causing some of it dissolve the salt.
The contacts on your tongue that detect tastes (like sweet, bitter, umami) do so through electrical signals. By adding salt to food, it means that your saliva will have more electrolytes, more conductive ions, at the surface of your tongue. That translates to a better conduction of the signal and thus a stronger taste.
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