"FleurDeSel" news and stories

Fleur de Sel is my favorite salt. Sprinkled over a chocolate mousse it incites intense gastronomical excitement. It tastes clean and fresh, like the ocean, and exudes an aroma of bright violets. Unfortunately, unlike most salt, it's not cheap. While you can spend as little as three dollars for three pounds of kosher salt, Fleur de Sel costs approximately 10 dollars for only 5 ounces. But, of course, there is no comparison when it comes to the enormous difference in taste.

The reason why Fleur de Sel is so expensive has to do with its superior quality. To understand the price we pay for Fleur de Sel, we need to comprehend the intricate process involved in collecting it. Fleur de Sel must be harvested by hand with great care, because it is not supposed to touch the coarse grey salt beneath the surface. It is delicately scraped off of the surface where it floats.

Where does it come from?
The salt enters shallow marshes, called œillets, off the coast of Brittany from the Atlantic ocean through an elaborate series of 10 winding waterways. But, before entering the marshes, Fleur de Sel enters a basin, called a vasière, where fish, eels, and other living oceanic organisms are cleared from the water. The complicated system of canals that lead to the œillets is crucial. Ocean water has roughly 27 grams of salt per liter, but, by the time the water ends up in the œillets, it's far saltier, containing 300 grams of salt per liter. Information on how Fleur de Sel is collected and the type you should buy can be found after the jump.

Like many gourmands with a sweet tooth I'm strangely drawn toward candies that mix salt and sugar. I assume the reason that some crave what at first seems like an odd combination is because both components satisfy primal nutritional urges that are hardwired into our brains.

When it comes to candy bars, the pinnacle of salty-sweet perfection is Payday. I'm not sure why, but as a kid, I never tried one. Looking back it seems especially strange, since I loved eating Lawry's seasoned salt out of hand. These days Payday's amalgam of salty peanuts mashed together with caramel is just the thing to satisfiy my sweet and savory teeth. In the same vein, though perhaps a bit more intense, is Pulparindo. This chewy Mexican confection is not for everyone, but it hits my palate in all the right places, combining sour tamarind with sugar and chile pepper.

But when I'm feeling especially decadent and craving something salty and sweet I forgo candy bars. Instead, I whip up some chocolate bruschetta. Simply cut small pieces of bread as you would for bruschetta; top each with a small chunk of good dark chocolate; and toast until the chocolate melts, but hasn't lost its shape. Take them out, and finish each with a sprinkle of fleur de sel. In case anyone's wondering, I've yet to try chocolate-covered potato chips, but they're on my short list.

The gal over at I'm Mad And I Eat is a braver woman than me, and that's not just because I'm a man.

This past weekend she ventured out to collect fresh kelp during a record low tide, but was unable to do so. Instead she gathered three liters of sea water in an effort to complete her quest to create her own fleur de sel.

After filtering it through cheesecloth and boiling for several hours, the Pacific brine yielded three ouncesof slight beige flakes that she's proud to say tasted like salt. No word on whether she's cooked with it or had to phone the local poison control center.

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