Fresh herb sea salts

For many decades, Herbamare^® has been a food classic in many households and we cannot imagine living without seasoning.  Herbamare Spicy^® and Herbamare Diet^® - the first of which is particularly spicy - complete the range of A.Vogel fresh herb sea salts. Alfred Vogel found a way of combining all the healthy, tasty and nutritional aspects to suit every type of cooking.

Familiarise yourself with the wonderful aroma.  Close your eyes and breathe in deeply. Provence? Camargue? The wind?  The sea?  An amazing range of smells. In his classic book, The Nature Doctor, which first appeared in 1952, Alfred Vogel wrote, “Use only sea salt as a seasoning in the kitchen.”  According to Vogel, the valuable trace elements in sea salt not only have an excellent taste but also stimulate the internal metabolism. However sea salt is only one component, the other is the wonderful sense-stirring taste of fresh herbs and vegetables. The result of this combination is the truly delicious taste. To get to this stage, and for the store of aromas to be released on the palate, involves a lot of manual work, a great deal of knowledge about the processes of Nature and, above all, the quite special A.Vogel recipe.

From organic cultivation to tasty herb salt

“The principle of totality which modern biological medicine strives for also applies to nutrition.  It is well known that medicines made from fresh plants are superior to those made from dried ones,” wrote Alfred Vogel in an article in A.Vogel’s Gesundheits-Nachrichten in May 1964. Anything that applies to healing remedies also applies to health food remedies: Only fresh plants contain all the energy of nature.

Twelve garden fresh herbs and vegetables make up the original ingredients of the three herb sea salts, particularly the classic basic composition of Herbamare^®. These herbs are parsley, chives, basil, lovage, marjoram, rosemary and thyme.  The vegetables, celery, leek, cress, onions and garlic are mixed in with them. The chilli and pepper in tangy Herbamare^® Spicy give it its unique piquancy.  All the herbs and vegetables are organically grown (BIO SUISSE) and are cultivated by A.Vogel contract farmers in healthy soil, without the use of pesticides and herbicides. This guarantees freshness and a pure aroma from the lovingly tended garden. In addition to fresh herbs, A.Vogel fresh herb sea salts also contain the iodiferous sea alga, kelp. Where there is a lack of natural iodine, it constitutes an essential element of a healthy food supplement .

Opening the store of aromas

Immediately after harvesting and cleaning, the farmers deliver the herbs and vegetables – approximately 600 tons a year – to the Bioforce factory in Colmar in France where both the weight and quality are checked. No harvest batch should be more than 8 hours old! The criterion is “fresh and pure”. The herbs are now crushed, macerated, dried and ground and just after that, blended, according to the original recipe of A.Vogel. Here is a detailed account of the procedure:

After being crushed, the herbs are blended with the sea salt in the ratio of 1:2. This salt ‘mash’ is stored in barrels according to type or more precisely, the water content of the ingredients, for between 3 and 18 months. During this time, various things happen:  the herbs and vegetables are enclosed in the salt as if in a vault.  In this way the salt crystals extract the colourings and flavours, the essential oils and the enzymes as well as other active plant substances. Herbs and sea salt now combine to give the fresh herb sea salt its incomparable taste. Once the maceration process is over, the aromatic and vegetable mush is dried off in a vacuum at a maximum temperature of 40ºC. The dried salt cakes are coarsely broken, finely ground and blended according to the strict guidelines set by Alfred Vogel.

After further quality controls, the wonderfully aromatic mixtures are temporarily stored in huge silos. The next stage is filling the fresh herb sea salts into differing size dispensers on a fully automated fill and packaging line. Every single one of the sprinkler tubs -  almost 5 million - all of which carry the A.Vogel Brand guarantee, contains the full seasoning power of Nature and is completely free of flavour enhancers, additional emulsifying agents or E numbers.

Incidentally: Taste is not a question of quantity but of quality.  In the expensive manufacture of fresh herb sea salts, the ratio between fresh products and sea salt is 1:2, which ensures the stability of the product.  After the drying process, the proportion of vegetables is 6-8%

.…et voilà: The Family of Fresh Herb Salts

Now that you have sampled the wonderful aroma, we invite you to look at the family of A.Vogel herb mixtures.

1. Herbamare^® - the original

This fresh herb sea salt is made from 12 freshly harvested herbs and vegetables.  It is a fresh herb sea salt, which is singled out due to its intense taste and high quality.  Herbamare^® can be used wherever ordinary cooking salt and sea salt are used, e.g. to enhance the flavour of vegetables, salad sauces, rice, bread, eggs, meat, quark, tomatoes and much more. Herbamare^® is distributed in over 25 countries in all continents and is the classic A.Vogel herbal salt.

2. Herbamare Spicy^® - spicy and tangy

Herbamare Spicy is Herbamare’s piquant sister and is made up of 12 herbs and vegetables with the addition of chilli and pepper.  Spicy goes well with all piquant and ‘hot’ meals, such as pasta, pizza, lasagne, Mexican dishes, meat dishes, Asian dishes and of course grills. Herbamare Spicy: ideal for all those who like things a bit spicier.

3. Herbamare Diet^® - the low sodium sea salt

The very low sodium diet salt (salt substitute for food), Herbamare^® Diet, made from potassium chloride, magnesium chloride, fresh, aromatic, dried and organically grown (EG-Bio-VO 2092/91) vegetables and herbs, and the mineral rich, iodiferous sea alga, kelp. Herbamare^® Diet is very low in salt and especially suitable for low salt diets. It makes no difference what your own personal favourite is –  what Alfred Vogel wrote in Gesundheits-Nachrichten in May 1964 still applies today: “Herbamare^® is both a seasoning and a foodstuff, a delight to the palate and a treat for the body.”