Dulse

Family Palmariaceae

• Portuguese: Alga vermelha
• Spanish: Alga roja
• French: Algue rouge
• Swedish: Rödsallat
• Norwegian: Søl
• Danish: Søl
• Icelandic: Söl
• Other: Dillisk (Irish)

REMARKS Dulse is a broad-leaved seaweed, crimson in colour, which grows to a length of about 30 cm. It occurs on both sides of the North Atlantic and is harvested commercially in the United States and Canada; especially in the Bay of Fundy, where the island of Grand Manan is a rich source.

The species Laurencia pinnatifida (Hudson), known as the pepper-dulse, may be of any colour in the spectrum from yellow-green to red-brown and reaches a length of 18 cm. It is pungent and used as a condiment (in Scotland, for example) rather than as a food. Some Icelanders chew it instead of tobacco, just as the Irish used to chew ordinary dulse. (A Canadian publication during the Second World War stated knowingly that ‘. . . in Great Britain, chewing dulse is comparable to our habit of chewing gum.’ The author must have been thinking of Ireland.)