BBC Inside The Factory visits Wick-based SHORE for seaweed harvest - episode broadcasting Tuesday 25 April

22nd April 2023

SHORE INVITES TV's CHERRY HEALEY AND BBC INSIDE THE FACTORY TO SEAWEED HARVEST IN WICK

TV's Cherry Healey has paid a visit to Wick-based SHORE as part of a BBC Inside The Factory vegan special. Cherry worked with SHORE'S Peter Elbourne and a team of local harvesters to collect and learn about different types of seaweed. The programme explores the different usages of seaweed in food manufacture.

Broadcasting on BBC 2 at 8 pm on Tuesday 25th April and 7.30pm on Saturday 29th April, the show specifically looks at how this ocean wonder is used as casings for vegan sausages. Cherry also cooked up some wonderful seafood dishes with seaweed with Jim Cowie, head chef and co-owner of The Captain's Galley in Scrabster.

SHORE has been sustainably harvesting and drying seaweed along the Scottish coastline since 2016, turning this local umami-rich superfood into its all-natural super grain chips and now also supplying companies across the UK and beyond.

SHORE's ethos revolves around the nature of sustainable seaweed harvesting that works in unison with the environment, whilst providing support and employment for its local rural communities. Uniquely, seaweed grows with zero need for land, fresh water or fertiliser and also absorbs oceanic CO2, so is the perfect crop for the climate emergency era.

On a mission to transform their local seaweed into a leading source of plant-based nutrition, SHORE’s small and passionate 15-strong team works all year round, and in all weathers, to hand harvest the best seaweed from the rugged, isolated shorelines of Wick in the far north of Scotland, one of UK’s most remote communities.

Here the local waters are clean and cool, with strong tides that provide the perfect conditions and vital nutrients for great quality seaweed to grow. In 2018 the company was also the first seaweed company in Scotland to put a farm into the sea, focusing on selected species of seaweed that are in high demand but more difficult to harvest from the wild.

Back at the factory, the seaweed is carefully sorted, washed and then dried at low temperature to preserve nutrients. It’s then milled to a range of sizes and stored for year-round supply. Last year the team harvested over 75 tonnes across 10 different species.

SHORE creates delicious crisps/chips, ramen broth and pesto which are made with the harvested seaweed as a hero ingredient. The crisps/chips, that launched in 2020, are now stocked in Holland and Barrett, Booths, Sainsburys, Coop, Selfridges and now exported as far afield as the USA, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Last year the SHORE brand grew by 72% and was one of the fastest selling healthier crisp products in stores (Nielsen Grocery Multiples w/e 14 January 2023) proving the new and increasing appetite for seaweed snacks, a market now worth more than £4m (Neilson Nov 2021).

Seaweed meets some key consumer drivers in the snacking category - new & inspiring snacking innovation, interest in Asian flavours, increased focus on health and wellbeing and sustainability & provenance of ingredients.

PHOTO
Cherry Healey harvesting Scottish seaweed with SHORE co-founder Peter Elbourne.