It's Dulse Season

Each year around Easter time we set out to harvest as much dulse seaweed as we can. Its smooth and delicate fronds have a smoky, almost bacon-like flavor, so it's always in high demand! To access the sheltered coastlines on which it grows, we need low tides and calm waters. These two elements don't coincide often in Lofoten, so when the year's lowest tides come around in April, it's all hands on deck to harvest as much delicious dulse as possible.

Other names: Dillisk, Creathnach, S?l

Dulse is a type of red algae that grows along sheltered coastlines in the Atlantic, from Northern Russia all the way down to Portugal, as well as the Atlantic coast of the USA and Canada. Its fronds are flat, smooth and leathery, changing color from deep maroon in winter to green-yellow in summer. Individual leaves can fork into two smaller fronds at the tip, and appear translucent when fresh due to its high water content. Dulse is normally harvested between September and April. Dulse is most commonly found growing on shallowly submerged rocks, but is also known to grow on the roots of oarweed?(Laminara digitata).

Dulse has been a vital food source for Atlantic coastal communities for thousands of years. Centuries ago, it was considered by the Vikings to be a great accompaniment to mead, and since then it has forged a long tradition in Atlantic coastal communities across the world. It’s even suggested that Norwegian Vikings would take dulse with them on long voyages as a snack to ward off disease:

“Norwegians… ate fresh dulse baked in bread and dried and salted dulse as a sort of snack. For the preparation of a meal, the seaweed was mixed with butter or lard and served with dried fresh or cooked potatoes and turnips. Another way of preparing dulse was to cook it with milk or put it in porridge. Finally, dulse has also been added to bread dough in order to make the flour stretch farther. The Norwegian Vikings probably brought dried seaweeds with them as provisions for their long expeditions maybe having realized?[sic]?that it protected the seafarers against scurvy.” Mouritsen, J Appl Phycol (2013) 25:1777–1791

In Iceland, dulse was even used as a form of currency around the 700s, facilitating trade between coastal dwellers and inland communities. The cost of renting a farm was often expressed in terms of seaweed quantity, and the quality of seaweed was judged during the drying process – when it was rinsed and laid out to dry, a layer of sugar and amino acids would seep out and dry on the leaves of the seaweed. The more concentrated the deposits, the higher the quality of seaweed. They didn’t know it at the time, but that powdery substance they prized so highly was the naturally-occurring monosodium glutamates found in seaweed, the trigger for the umami flavor we still love to this day!

For more on dulse, its nutritional values and our favorite recipes, check out our full link below. Plus learn about our other favorite kelp!

From Lofoten, Weed Love!