One of our favorite salts, this fleur de sel rocks! The distinctive taste combined with the best price per ounce, not to mention the easyto-use, resealable bag push it to the top of the list!

Serving Suggestions

Use the salt in this little re-sealable bag to finish grilled meats and fish, as well as simple or composed salads. We keep some in a small salt cellar for use at the table as well.

Why Sea Salt

As a finishing condiment, there is nothing better than a fine sea salt from France. Sea salt farmers have gathered salt on France's Atlantic coast, especially in Brittany, since the time of the Romans. The area has an ideal combination of sun, wind and lowland marshes to allow the evaporation of the nutrient- and trace mineral-rich waters, leaving behind the "white gold."

Where the Salt Comes From

The three most prominent areas, Guérande, Ile de Ré, and Ile Noirmoutier, produce what is now considered some of the best sea salt in the world. One taste and we think you will agree. As with most of our products, once you have tried it, you will never go back to table salt again!

History

The coastal area around Guérande has a microclimate that is ideal for salt production. Salt workers - paludiers - are really farmers, and cultivate the salt marshes by hand. They channel the seawater into a series of basins of increasing salinity, and then let the sun and wind do their work.

Most evaporation takes place during the sunniest months, July, and August, when the paludiers continually rake their salt beds. When the evaporation process is complete, the grey salt ("sel gris") is harvested. But there are special days, which occur intermittently all summer long, before the evaporation process is complete, when the wind and the sun are just right: a white bloom appears on the water - the "Fleur" - the lightest of the salts, rich with the flavors of Brittany.

Aware that nature only offers this gift erratically, the paludiers quickly, gently, gather it. There was a time when they harvested only the grey salt, and the white crystals that accumulated on the surface were considered a nuisance because they slowed further evaporation. Then French chefs discovered the wonderful qualities of this salt, and a market for Fleur de Sel was born.

About Our Producer

Most of the salt farmers belong to a cooperative, which mixes the salt from different producers together, blending both above-average and below-average products. But Didier Aube is one of the few individuals who chose to go it alone, and we are thrilled - his Fleur de Sel is divine.

Pricing

Multiple pricing is available on this item at quantities of three, five and ten. See the price in the shopping basket when you choose quantities larger than three.