Salt Pig

4.5” x 4.5” x 5.5"
Stoneware
ENGLAND

A pig for your salt, a salt for your pig. I am, I must admit, a piggy for the salty, even on my melon. Is it a  primitive reaction that the more salt one eats the more one wants? In recent years I have gone from a pig half this size to the current one. The salt pig has been in production since the early 1990s. Designed by John Leach, the grandson of Bernard Leach, England's most well-known potter to some; produced by his workshop Muchelney Pottery in Somerset and now made by Master Potter, Mark Melbourne. The pot is handmade using local stoneware clays and fired in the three-chambered wood-fired climbing kiln to temperatures of 1320 degrees centigrade which is what gives the distinctive 'toasted' finish to the outside of the pot. And why call it a pig? Most likely the expression comes from the Scottish word "pig" or "piggin" meaning earthenware pot or jar. The clay pig absorbs water so the salt does not clump. The shape fits into the hand and is easy to hold. Ours continuously swings back and forth from the table to the stove, less like a pig, more like a monkey.