Simply French! Radishes With Butter and Fleur De Sel

A classic French way of serving radishes, simple and yet so good; crunchy radishes are simply served with fresh butter and sea salt. I like to serve mine with Fleur de Sel, which is the caviar of French sea salts. You will be offered this in most French homes as an aperitif snack or as an appetiser before a meal. All that is needed is some traditional French bread to accompany it for a light lunch or supper dish. Table salt is fine if you cannot source Fleur de Sel or a good sea salt. (Information on Fleur de Sel: Many consider fleur de sel, which means “flower of salt” in French, the finest type of sea salt available. Its price reflects its high quality, as it costs about 10 times more than your average sea salt and 100 times more than table salt. The delicacy with which it is hand-harvested accounts for much of the expense. Fleur de sel floats on the surface of shallow salt water marshes and is scraped off with a special rake called a lousse à de fleur. The raking must be done carefully by hand to prevent mixing the fleur de sel with the coarse gray salt beneath it. France harvests most of the world’s fleur de sel, with the town of Guérande possibly being the most famous producer. Fleur de sel has a higher mineral content than table salt, a natural greyish hue, a moist texture and a violet-like fragrance. Sprinkle it on food before serving to enliven flavours.)