ESBAL

The salting house of Ílhavo

On the edge of the Ria de Aveiro lagoon, in Ílhavo, the historic heart of Portugal's bacalhau culture, you'll find ESBAL. Since 1993, the company has dedicated itself to a single craft: the traditional wet-salting of cod, the cure that gives bacalhau its character. For more than thirty years, ESBAL has honoured the Portuguese bacalhau tradition, uniting time-proven processes with modern technology to deliver what the Portuguese call o verdadeiro bacalhau português: the true Portuguese cod, completely natural.

Today, ESBAL is part of the VSV family of companies. Together with our salting operations in Vestmannaeyjar and Grupeixe, its neighbour in Gafanha da Nazaré, ESBAL completes the chain from Icelandic fishing grounds to the Portuguese table. One owner, one standard of quality, from catch to cure to drying.

From salt to table, completely natural

The cure is where ESBAL's thirty years of know-how show. The right fish, the right salt, the right time. A slow craft where rigorous quality control and respect for tradition together guarantee a genuinely natural product, cured to the exacting standards Portuguese consumers demand.

Alongside the wet-salted cod, ESBAL also produces thawed ultra-frozen bacalhau, already soaked and ready to cook, meeting the needs of the modern kitchen without compromising on authenticity. Every part of the fish is put to use, with by-products finding their own markets, out of respect for the resource in the best Icelandic and Portuguese tradition.

Completing the bacalhau chain

VSV has salted cod for the Portuguese market for the better part of a century. With ESBAL joining Grupeixe in the VSV family, the two companies now cover the market together: ESBAL cures the wet-salted bacalhau, while Grupeixe dries and brings it to market. That gives VSV full control of quality and traceability at every stage, from the wild shores of Vestmannaeyjar to the dinner tables of Portugal. For consumers, it means the true Portuguese bacalhau, backed by the freshest raw material in the North Atlantic.