Salicornia, Salicornia, Salsola

These three plants are similar in use, so I treat them together. They are collectively known as les salicornes in French, and have their uses further north, into which I do not enter here.

Glasswort, a peculiar fleshy plant, grows in company with its friend saltwort in salt marshes near the sea. They both make a rather bracing salad, with or without some drops of wine vinegar, to consume with an aperitif; picked in June when the tender new growth appears, from a marsh behind the beach, after bathing. In this marsh also grows the flexible reed, Juncus effusus, which is gathered to make the little woven baskets (fiscelle in Salentine dialect) used to drain fresh sheep’s cheeses.