Benefits of seaweed: Why you should be enjoying this superfood regularly

Benefits of Seaweed: Why You Should Enjoy This Superfood Regularly

These wild food enthusiasts say it’s time to embrace the culinary potential of nature’s magical marine plants—seaweed. Here are the benefits of this superfood.

Foraging for Seaweed

Peter Langlands, a professional forager for the past seven years, scours the Banks Peninsula coastline for seaweed several times a month. Based in Canterbury, Peter also travels around the country, running foraging workshops and hunting for wild foods for restaurants. About 70 percent of Peter’s daily diet is foraged from the land or ocean. While he searches for anything edible, he is particularly knowledgeable about seaweed, also known as sea vegetables in Asia and beyond.

Seaweed in Global Cuisines

Seaweed has been farmed in Asia for centuries and is commonly used in coastal cuisines in Japan, China, and Korea. It is also eaten in coastal Europe, in places like Iceland, Norway, and Wales. Māori once ate karengo, a red seaweed found on rocky shores, and used bull kelp to store processed mutton bird.

In Japan, seaweed is used in everything from preparing dashi broth to salads, soups, and wrapping sushi rolls. In New Zealand, seaweed has been commercially harvested on a small scale since 2010 and is being turned into animal food, garden fertilizer, medicinal and pharmaceutical products, and food products.

The Magic of Seaweed

Peter, of Wild Foods, can’t say enough about the magic of seaweed. New Zealand has more than 1000 different varieties, and some of the most diverse and rich species in the world are found along its coastline. Only about 25 are actually edible or worth eating. The most popular varieties include wakame, bladder kelp, New Zealand kombu, karengo (New Zealand nori), bull kelp, and sea lettuce.

Foraging Tips

For those wanting to forage for their own seaweed, Peter advises knowing what you’re looking for and ensuring there is no water pollution or soil run-off. Wash your crop for stones and snails. Foraging for seaweed is not allowed in marine reserves, and there is a total ban on seaweed harvesting along the Kaikoura coastline to allow the ecosystem to recover after the 2016 earthquake.

Some species have a shorter shelf life. If they lie on the beach too long, particularly in the sun, they can spoil. Look for a uniform color, and if there is any blotchiness or a smell that suggests it has passed its use-by date, it’s best to avoid it. Once it starts to break down, you’ll notice variation in colors.

Nutritional Benefits

Seaweeds are classified by their various colors: brown, green, and red, and they all have different nutritional properties. All contain nutrients and minerals, trace elements, vitamins, and iodine. They also contain a complete, fat-free protein similar to that of an egg, which is easily digestible. When we eat them, they have a cleansing function, especially green seaweeds like sea lettuce, which contains alginic acid. They’re also packed with fucoidan, which has been scientifically proven to inhibit the growth of pathogenic bacteria, fungi, and viruses. Green seaweeds are also rich in chlorophyll, just like green vegetables grown on land.

Peter particularly praises kelp, which contains natural glutamic salts. Glutamine is an amino acid known to be a superb brain food. Bladder kelp is thought to be one of the fastest-growing plants in the world, growing up to a meter in a single day. It’s also most sensitive to changes in sea temperatures.

Preparing and Eating Seaweed

Peter has some tips on how to prepare and eat seaweeds. He oven-bakes kelp blades and eats them like potato chips. It has quite a salty flavor, and when dried and crushed, it makes a top seaweed sprinkle that can be used as a healthy substitute for salt but with a more complex flavor. It’s good to grind it into a powder to make a seasoning—smoke it first with mānuka to infuse some more flavor, and roasting will enhance the flavor too. He dehydrates wakame and then makes powders, which he sprinkles on dishes. Wakame has a lovely soft texture, so he also blanches it and lightly seasons it.

One way New Zealanders often consume seaweed is via dehydrated nori sushi wraps. However, Peter scoffs at the nori wrapped around sushi rolls, saying it’s nutritionally dead and highly processed.

Seaweed Sources

For those wanting to try seaweed, a few New Zealand companies are transforming edible seaweed into food products. In the South, two farming families harvest kelp and wakame from around Stewart Island and Foveaux Strait and off the Otago coast. Their wakame and kelp seasonings and freeze-dried products are sold under the Kiwi Wakame brand. On Banks Peninsula, farmers Roger and Nicki Beattie harvest giant kelp from the nearby ocean. Under their NZ Kelp brand, they create a kelp pepper for dinner tables. They have also turned kelp into a health supplement for livestock and a natural fertilizer.

Pacific Harvest has harvested and sold seaweeds for more than 18 years. Its new owner and managing director, Hayley Fraser-Mackenzie, previously worked at New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, where she became interested in the rise of plant-based nutrition.

Pacific Harvest makes a kelp salt to replace normal salt and also sells seaweed seasonings and dried seaweeds. Hayley says seaweed adds unique umami flavors, wonderful texture, and visual appeal to any meal or snack. Even a small addition of sea vegetables to your daily meals can have a big impact. For those worried about hormonal imbalance or thyroid issues, seaweed is a natural leveler. Seaweed’s status as a vegan superfood grows daily.

However, commercial farming hasn’t really taken off here yet. Different species grow in different areas and at different depths. Hayley thinks there is room to change the rules around seaweed harvesting and possibly obtain more from New Zealand waters in ethical ways. Kelp harvesting is currently managed under New Zealand’s quota system.