Dear friends of Pesto Fresco, today we are telling you about Italian sea salt, which our Frasca & Nassa Laboratory in Loano uses to make Genoese pesto.

As we like to emphasize, our artisan workshop uses selected raw materials exclusively from Italian production to give our Pesto Fresco the true flavor of ancient Ligurian tradition.

So, we said: sea salt is a rich resource, “white gold,” which has its roots in the distant past.

In fact, even in ancient times its use was widespread, to the point of becoming indispensable, mainly for preserving food, but also for flavoring it, or in craft activities, such as dyeing or tanning hides.

Only the people on the coast possessed salt in abundance, so over time the “salt routes,” or paths, mule tracks, and routes were born from the mountains and hills that took inland men to the sea men to buy the “white gold.”

The ancient “salt routes” are many in Liguria, and they are worth retracing. We will soon discuss them in our blog with some specific references.

Instead, today we would like to focus on the benefits of sea salt, of which there are many.

In addition to flavoring foods, meat, fish, spices, herbs, it is also used for cooking.

Sea salt is not refined like ordinary salt and is obtained through a very natural process: it is left to dry in the sun. In this way it preserves a huge amount of substances, minerals, iodine and magnesium that are very valuable for our bodies.

Because it is unrefined, it is less white than the common one because it is completely free of (unhealthy) bleaching additives. Because it has a stronger flavor, it should be used sparingly .

Sea salt has long been a kind of medicine, in fact it protects intestines, kidneys and circulation, eliminates spasms and cramps, regulates blood sugar levels, and prevents and relieves osteoporosis.

A genuine natural resource worth its weight in gold!