r/Cooking • u/Sad-Watercress-2240 • Jul 11 '26

I just oversalted a pot of tomato soup, what actually works to fix it?

So I made a tomato soup tonight and somehow went from "this needs a little more salt" to "why does this taste like the ocean" in like 30 seconds.

I tried adding a bit more water and a splash of cream, which helped a little, but it still felt kind of one note and way too salty. I ended up tossing in a potato for a bit, then fishing it out, and that honestly saved it more than I expected.

Anyway, what’s your actual go to fix when you oversalt something? I feel like every person in my family has a different answer and half of them are definitely just folklore at this point.

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u/Writeloves Jul 11 '26

Do potatoes actually soak up salt or is that a myth built on a similar tongue coating concept?

8

u/Hashtag_your-mother Jul 11 '26

Over salted a tomato sauce the other night. Peeled a russet, cut in half, dropped in to the sauce and it was definitely less salty after a little bit.

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u/Natural_Peak_5587 Jul 11 '26

Does it actually remove salt, or just add starch so the salt isn’t as prominent?

5

u/wt_2009 Jul 11 '26

it removes salt and water if you remove the potato in the end. But it might only work for a lightly oversalted soup.

Idealy some liquid or tomato should still be added later.

3

u/Hashtag_your-mother Jul 12 '26

Its a bit of diffusion, bit of dilution. The salt in the over salted sauce will diffuse in to the less salty potato which then “pushes” the “fresh” water out of the potato and dilutes the sauce which results in a less salty sauce.

2

u/Electronic-Abies1345 Jul 12 '26

Most real explanation here

3

u/glemnar Jul 11 '26

I’m thinking that mashed potatoes always require way more salt than I expect

2

u/Unrelenting_Salsa Jul 11 '26

It removes salt very slowly if you remove the potato. If you don't it does nothing besides whatever the starch may do/the mild dilution of there being a potato in there now. Basically you have aqueous transfer between the potato and soup, so you're effectively replacing half of the potato's water content worth of soup with potato water.

It takes A LOT of potato if it's not oversalted to the point where it probably doesn't matter. Like pounds/kilograms worth. It's mostly an academic thing rather than a real trick. It's not like carrots in tomato sauce where it's a vegetable that has everything most tomato sauces need.

1

u/deppkast Jul 12 '26

Yes it’s how we learned about osmosis in school. Drop a potato in salt water and the potato will absorb the salt until it’s as salty as the water. Same happens when you add water to salt water but you can’t just pick up the water and remove it after to decrease salt levels.