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Video length: 4 min
Scotland: Salt production attracts fans
In Scotland, using a traditional method, a salt producer has managed to transform the evaporation of sea water into salt crystals.
It was an almost forgotten wealth in Scotland, hidden in the heart of the cold waters. Facing the sea, an astonishing 8-meter-high structure that now stands like a rampart to perpetuate the tradition. A tower to produce salt. At the heart of the Blackthorn Salt Tower, in the Scottish town of Ayr. A unique structure in the United Kingdom and one of the only ones in Europe still in operation. Filled with blackthorn branches, the building operates according to an ancient industrial process: the graduation of brine. The idea? To produce soft flakes of salt by evaporating seawater over a large vertical surface.
The method dates back several hundred years. For Grégoire Marshall, head of the activity, it is above all about renewing a family tradition. The production is far from competing with the enormous quantities produced by industrialists. But with one difference: off-white crystals, with an irregular shape, with a milder and less neutral taste than traditional table salt.