Cooking with seaweed- Dulse

Freshly picked Dulse

It was mainly Prannie Rhatigan’s fascinating modern cookery book “Irish Seaweed Kitchen“ which got us going. The receipes are just too tempting. So we thought let’s start with something easy and tasty – dulse (known to the marine biologists as Palmaria palmata), found in the mid intertidal zone.

Scissors are our new equipment, when heading for the beach!

We found some lovely dark purple dulse off La Rocque Harbour halfway to Seymour Tower. Close to its holdfast was some beautiful frosted seamat growing, a stunning colony of minute moss animals. Those we left behind, as you should only take part of the fronds, in this case we cut them lengthwise, so the plant can regenerate.

Dulse after drying

After quickly rinsing the dulse at home, we spread it on grease proof paper on a tray from the oven and let it dry for a day in the sunny conservatory. To get it really crispy we then placed the tray overnight on the kitchen radiator. The last step: store in an air-tight jar or in sealed bags.

Crumbled up, dulse is a lovely condiment, but you can also use it fresh, cut in small pieces in vegetable soup. Delicious.

Our next experiment will be using it in home made bread.