SAGRES

Where the land ends

The name comes from the Latin Sacrum, sacred, and the place has been held that way since the Celts. On the southwestern tip of the Algarve, the water of the Sea of Sagres is rated “A”, the highest quality standard, and is rich in iodine, which sharpens the flavor.

The tins

underwater

FARMING

Suspended in open water

The mussels grow anchored to ropes off the coast, exposed to strong ocean currents loaded with phytoplankton. That is what they feed on: as a filter feeder, the mussel takes in what the water brings it. Finisterra settled in Sagres in November 2010.

boat

PROCESS

Three miles to the port

From the farm to Porto da Baleeira it is three nautical miles, and it is that short distance that keeps them fresh. Ashore, the mussels are washed with seawater pumped from more than twenty meters down, sorted by size, picked over, and steamed in their own water. The large and medium sizes are packed by hand, tin by tin; the rest by machine. Less than 24 hours pass between the harvest offshore and the finished tin.

Certifications

  • certificado EU v3

    EU Organic

    Organic Production Method certified by the European Union since November 2016.

  • certificado asc v2

    ASC

    As the ASC wrote in 2020: “Finisterra is not only the first Portuguese farm to be ASC certified, it is the first mussel farm anywhere in Continental Europe to gain certification”.