At Sea Veg® we’re always amazed by all the healthy benefits incorporating seaweed into your diet can bring. We’ve written several blog posts about the health benefits of seaweed, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t highlight everything seaweed can do. It’s really quite amazing! Learn more about the many uses of seaweed; it’s more than just a health food!

Using seaweed as a food additive

You’re probably already consuming seaweed and don’t even know it! Seaweed is used to keep ice cream smooth and creamy by preventing ice crystals from forming when freezing, and slows down the speed at which ice cream melts. It’s used in beers for a more stable and lasting foam, and in wines to help clarify the color. It can be used to thicken and stabilize sauces, syrups, soups, mayonnaise, salad dressings, and yogurt. It’s a fairly common food additive.

The beauty of seaweed: cosmetics and beauty products

Seaweed, sea kelp, and algae offer superior hydration as well as anti-aging and anti-inflammatory benefits. The same seaweed extracts used in food are also common ingredients in lotions and creams. Seaweed is used as a stabilizing agent in toothpaste. Seaweed is also used in soaps and shampoos, and in addition to its function for gelling various ingredients together. You may have seaweed on your face as you read this! Seaweed baths are still popular in some parts of the world; there are still many who swear by their health benefits for the treatment of ailments like arthritis, rheumatism and various skin conditions. Seaweed baths are said to detoxify the body

Plants derive healthy benefits from seaweed

Seaweed has a suitable nitrogen and potassium content for fertilizer, and its large amounts of insoluble carbohydrates are great for retaining moisture. Some seaweed fertilizers have been commercialized with dried seaweed or seaweed extracts. There are also liquid seaweed fertilizers.

Fueling our future with biofuel

A group at the Korea Institute of Technology has developed a way to use seaweed to produce bioethanol and avoid taking up land, often a concern when creating biofuels. The group says seaweed has a number of advantages over land-based biomass: it grows faster, allowing up to six harvests per year; unlike trees and plants, it does not contain lignin and so requires no pre-treatment before it can be turned into fuel; and it absorbs up to seven times as much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as wood.

Animal feed

For a long time, animals such as sheep, cattle and horses that lived in coastal areas have eaten seaweed, especially in those European countries where large brown seaweeds were washed ashore. Today the availability of seaweed for animals has been increased with the production of seaweed meal: dried seaweed that has been milled to a fine powder.

Getting the lead out: removing heavy metal ions

According to ScienceDirect, there are abilities of different species of seaweeds and their derivatives to remove a range of heavy metals from liquids. Seaweed can effectively reduce phosphorous and nitrogen content from the discharge of sewage treatments and agricultural runoff.

Of course, it’s also a healthy addition to your diet!

Clearly seaweed has some amazing benefits, even without consuming it! However, we still think one of the best uses of seaweed is adding it to your own diet to enjoy all the healthy benefits. Lucky for us, if you’re not a fan of sushi or eating seaweed in general, there are high quality seaweed supplements such as Sea Veg®. The 12 seaweed varieties in our Sea Veg supplements are some of the most nutritionally dense plants on the planet and also the most abundant source of minerals in the plant kingdom.

Now that you know the many uses of seaweed, aren’t you ready to give it a try too?