On every estuary tour, at some point I reach over the side of the kayak, pinch off a bright green stem, and hand it around. Pickleweed. Most people have paddled past it a hundred times without noticing. Then they bite in, and their eyes go wide: crunchy, juicy, and salty like the water it grows in.
These days pickleweed is getting a rebrand. Chefs and markets call it sea bean, or by its Latin name, salicornia. Whatever you call it, here’s how I think about it: the oyster is the taste of the sea. Sea bean is the taste of the estuary.
Pickleweed is native here. It carpets the tidal marshes of the Carneros Estuary and the lower Napa River, and it lives right at the line where fresh water meets salt.
That’s why it tastes different through the year. The salt in the plant rises and falls with the salinity of the estuary. After a wet winter, when the river pushes fresh water down, it’s milder. In late summer and fall, when the bay pushes salt water up, it gets punchier. Every bite is a reading of the water that day.
It’s about to get a lot more of the spotlight locally, too. Clover Flat Landfill settlement money is going toward restoring Huichica Creek in Carneros and Suscol Creek in south Napa. At Huichica, the Napa County Resource Conservation District and its neighbors aim to turn about 70 acres of former vineyard back into wetland, with the Register putting it nicely: the prize plant will be “pickleweed instead of Pinot Noir.” The Suscol project aims for 100 acres of wetland, partly as a buffer against sea level rise.
Want to see it up close? The district is hosting a free family field day at Huichica Creek on October 24, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Details at naparcd.org.
The little plant we snack on from a kayak has a bigger life than you’d guess:
• Fine dining in Spain. Aponiente, the Michelin-starred “restaurant of the sea” in Cádiz, has turned salicornia into pesto.
• A delicacy in Egypt. There they keep it simple: a drizzle of olive oil and that’s it.
• Face cream in Copenhagen. Oil from the plant is going into cosmetics.
• A crop for a warmer world. Sea bean grows in salt water. As seas rise and salt creeps into low-lying farmland like rice paddies, sea bean could be grown in its place. Trials have been running for years in West Africa and Vietnam.
• Bay Area markets. You’ll find it in boutique French grocers around the Bay.
It’s a family thing, too. My mother chops it fine into her mignonette and spoons it over oysters. The taste of the sea, meet the taste of the estuary.
She also folds it into an old family pimiento cheese recipe from Oklahoma, one whose roots go back to the Louisiana bayou. A little marsh salt in a Southern classic.
One rule before you start: do not add salt. Sea bean brings plenty of its own.
• 1 cup fresh salicornia (sea beans / pickleweed)
• ½ cup Italian parsley
• ¼ cup basil (optional)
• ¼ cup Marcona almonds or toasted pine nuts
• 1 small garlic clove
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp Manchego or Parmesan
• Optional: 1 tsp fish sauce or an anchovy
• Fresh black pepper
The best place to try sea bean is right where it grows, with the tide moving under your boat. Join us on an estuary tour and we’ll hand you a stem. One bite and you’ll never paddle past it again.
Book a Carneros Estuary tour →
• Clover Flat money to help south Napa County creeks, Napa Valley Register, Oct 12, 2026
• Huichica Creek Field Day, Napa County RCD