Eat your “sea” veggies!
View Patricia Joy Becker’s video talk on sea vegetables and seaweed.
Sea vegetables (also known as kelp and seaweed) are edible algae that can be eaten as is or used as an ingredient in recipes. The most common types to eat are alaria, arame, dulse, hijiki, kelp, kombu, nori, and wakame. They have been consumed by coastal people for thousands of years and for good reason. According to Dr. Gabriel Cousens in his book Conscious Eating, sea vegetables are packed with protein, vitamins and minerals. In fact, they are “higher in minerals and vitamins than any other class of food” and unlike land vegetables “have all the fifty six minerals and trace elements our bodies require.” In addition to vitamins A, B, C, and E, sea vegetables contain human-utliizable vitamin B12, which is challenging to get on a whole food, plant-based (WFPB) vegan diet. For example, one-half ounce of alaria contains 10 times more vitamin B12 than the recommended daily requirement. One-half ounce of kelp has 1-2 times the daily minimum requirement and nori has 2-3 times.