Fleur de sel de Guérande

Fleur de sel de Guérande

What it is

Fleur de sel sets as a thin crust on the surface of the pan on dry days with a light easterly, and the paludier lifts it with a flat wooden board called a lousse without ever touching the clay floor — grey salt is what is raked off the bottom afterwards. The marshes have been worked since the ninth century, and it is the clay that keeps the salt damp: it never fully dries.

In the kitchen

Never cook with it and never put it in a liquid: the crunch is the whole product and it dissolves there into ordinary salinity. Add it once the plate is off the heat, and keep it in a closed pot — at about 5% moisture it cakes if left open and takes up whatever the kitchen smells of.

Goes with

Butter Radish Tomato Turbot Smoked salmon Strawberry

Same species

Alaea red Hawaiian salt Sodium bicarbonate Himalayan pink salt Kala namak (Indian black salt) Kansui Kosher salt

Also used with

Pauillac lamb Nantucket bay scallop Black Krim tomato Blond chocolate Rubia Gallega old-cow beef Bonnotte de Noirmoutier

In season alongside

Albacore Boquerones Borage Brill Arctic char Clam

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