The short version
Salt your meat the night before. Or at minimum, 45 minutes ahead. Do not salt right before cooking unless you have no choice.
Why it matters
Salt draws moisture to the surface. That moisture dissolves the salt, then gets reabsorbed into the muscle — usually within 40–45 minutes at room temperature.
If you cook at the 5–10 minute mark, that surface moisture is wet and hasn't gone back in. Steam replaces sear. You lose the crust.
Wait it out, and the salt migrates into the muscle fibres. Flavour reaches deeper. The surface dries again. Crust forms.
Timing by cut
| Cut | Minimum rest | Ideal rest |
|---|---|---|
| Thin chops, chicken breast | 45 min | 4–8 hours |
| Steak 2–3 cm thick | 1 hour | Overnight |
| Whole chicken | 2 hours | 24–48 hours |
| Large roast | 4 hours | 48 hours |
Refrigerate for anything beyond 1 hour. Leave uncovered — the surface dries out, which helps browning.
How much salt
Use kosher or coarse sea salt. 1 tsp per 500 g of meat, applied to all surfaces. Rub it in. Don't be shy on thick cuts.
Fine table salt goes in at half that rate — it's denser and oversalts fast.
Common mistakes
Salting right before the pan. Surface moisture has no time to reabsorb. You'd need to dry the meat with paper towels just to get any crust.
Covering with cling film. Traps moisture on the surface. Leave it uncovered in the fridge.
Rinsing before cooking. The whole point was to get salt into the meat. Rinsing undoes all of it.
One more step
After the overnight brine, pull meat from the fridge 30 minutes before cooking. Let the temperature even out. Cold meat hitting a hot pan drops the pan temperature, slows the Maillard reaction, and steams the bottom layer instead of searing it.
Dry surface. Room-temperature meat. Ripping hot pan. In that order.
