Of sardines, sardine sandwiches, and much more
Sardines–look at the little dears nestled in their can bathed in olive oil–are one of the more curious of the world’s foods. They are one of that select group of foods, pineapple and sweet corn being others, that were created by canning.
Before you yelp, yes of course in some sense all of them were around beforehand but only as odd specialties. Pineapple, unless you lived in the central part of the Americas, was nurtured in the hot houses of the rich. Sweet corn was a highly seasonal specialty, being the young ears of corn. It still is in Mexico. Now both these specialities are grown to be canned and marketed to millions.
Sardines are a slightly different case. For thousands of years, people had been eating young clupeids, as the herring family, probably the most important group of food fish in the world, are called. There are at least 300 species and people munched away on whatever their local species was without giving a damn about Linnaeus and his efforts to sort the living world out.
The British, along with the Dutch and the Scandinavians, were some of the greatest clupeid eaters in the world, thanks to the riches of the North Sea. Dutch prosperity in the seventeenth century (and all those gorgeous still lives of food) was founded on herring bones as the Dutch saying went, thanks to their huge export trade in pickled herring. The British followed, with a suite of preserved herring–red herring, bloaters, kippers, and dozens of dishes of fresh herring.
Fresh clupeids were and are appreciated in Britain in many forms. The real babies, just an inch long, are called whitebait, lightly fishy, crunchy when fried, with lemon and brown bread and butter on the side, have long been a treat as an appetizer or a lunch dish.
The herring youngsters, about three or four inches long, are called sprats, and different but equally delicious prepared the same way. My mouth waters.
The herring teenagers are called pilchards and only recently did the Cornish stop exporting preserved pilchards to the Mediterranean.
And the full grown herrings–pickled or grilled or soused or potted or fried in oatmeal have been a favorite for centuries.
And then there are sardines in a tin or in a can. There are two stories at least about how this happened and, given the world wide experimentation with canning in the nineteenth century, I wouldn’t be a bit surprised to run across many more.
One story says that it was Signor Giulio Trentino of Italy who put pilchards in earthen jars and called them sardines, the ancient Greek and Roman name deriving from Sardinia. The other story says that it was Monsieur Joseph Colin who began canning sardines at Nantes basing his technique on the older habit of preserving the fish in butter or olive oil in earthenware containers.
Either way, a huge kerfuffle ensued because the Norwegians, the Portuguese, the Canadians and the Americans were also canning whatever species of these little fish swam in their waters.
Enter Harvey Wiley of the United States Department of Agriculture, author of the US Food and Drug Law passed in 1906. Such confusion was intolerable, how could people know what they were eating? Mis-branding was going on all over the place.
After much huffing and puffing and bureaucratic to-ing and fro-ing, it was decided that a sardine was any small canned clupeoid fish no matter what the species. What had to to be specified was the country of origin and what liquid the fish was canned in. Check your local grocery store and you will find that this US decision had widepread influence. So the sardine was born.
Now the French in particular were very proud of their canned sardines, giving them vintages, laying down stocks, etc. I remember on one of my earlier visits to France seeing cans of silvery sardines in a specialty store–except the silver was foil and the sardines were chocolate. Chocolate imitating sardines. Well if that’s your thing, so be it.
Enter Marcel Boulestin. French and English cuisines have co-evolved since the Norman Conquest, and so it was with sardines. In the 1930s, one of the most influential interpreters of French cuisine in England was Marcel Boulestin. He’d been part of the Willy-Colette circle, dabbled in art buying a Modigliani for 12 quid and selling it for ninety, and had a well-regarded restaurant in London.
Improbably he wrote for the Evening Standard which, if not a tabloid, certainly did not have the dignity of the Times or the worthiness of the Guardian (though actually he also did write for the Guardian and for Vogue from time to time). He also invented television cheffery, not just in Britain but in the world, appearing on the BBC from 1937.
In his Evening Standard Book of Menus (1935), Boulestin offered a recipe for sardine butter, canned sardines pounded to a paste and mixed with an equal quantity of butter. I’m sure it wasn’t his invention because it drew on long French and English traditions of pounding and preserving meat or fish in butter. Potted shrimp is a classic English example. (This is a wonderful technique by the way, quite extraordinarily useful).
Canned sardines soon took an honored place in British cuisine, usually in this form, alongside all the fresh herring dishes and the more traditional preserved herring dishes. A kind of sardine pate cropped up in appetizers on toast and in sandwiches. Like milk and cheese, like pork and ham, fresh and preserved herring have different qualities and are used in different ways.
And that’s where we get to what prompted this little dissertation. Maria Verivaki of Organically Cooked is making a heroic attempt to come to terms with British Cuisine in spite of deep, deep suspicions (ones she shares with many of her readers whose comments leave me with my jaw dropping). She wonders why the British ate sandwiches of canned sardines instead of the fresh sardines that she prepares for her family.
Well, fresh sardines (which under the name of sprats) were and are eaten in Britain with gusto for main meals don’t make good sandwiches. Canned sardines mashed with butter, perhaps a tad of hot sauce and/or lemon make wonderful, tasty and economical sandwiches. When you go on a picnic you want something portable, tasty, and that won’t fall apart. They joined cheese and tomato and egg as ideal picnic sandwiches with butter between two slices of good bread.
Jolly good too. Tomorrow I shall make potted sardines with the contents of this can and enjoy them over the next several days. Try it.
As Rachel mentioned, in terms of canned fish “Sardine” etc is a generic term and the actual can could contain any number of different, if similar, species, depending on point of origin.
Local fish names can be a bit of a nightmare, but Europe sardines and pilchards are the same species of fish as indicated in the scientific name Sardina pilchardus. Sprats are also a distict species, Sprattus sprattus, although in all cases these names have been applied to other species of similar fish. Pilchards tend to be the name for the bigger adult fish and sardine are smaller immature fish. Swedish anchovies are preserved sprats, not anchovies.
Fresh sardines were eaten in Britain were they were fished (Cornwall mostly), but they spoil quickly and most of Britian has access to a similar and better fish (the Herring, Clupea harengus), but again they were mostly eaten as a preserved fish. All of these fish spoil quickly so eating them fresh is not possible for most people.
Now that transporation has changed things have changed. Fresh Cornish Sardines are now very popular in the UK.
http://www.cornishsardines.org.uk/content/view/5/36/
A huge amount of the fish eaten historically (and now) around the Mediterranean are preserved Northern European fish. Cod, ling, herring and pilchards/sardines.
Wonderful essay, Rachel. You’ll be interested to know, I’m sure, that pilchards are still today being preserved and exported to the Mediterranean from Cornwall. Pilchard Works may be the only remaining company from what was once a thriving industry, but they have apparently been selling cured (salted and tinned) pilchards to the Italians since 1905. I came across them for the first time a few years ago at the Salone del Gusto in Turin, even though they are near neighbours, just across the Tamar from Devon. See http://www.pilchardworks.co.uk
A question: some years ago when researching and photographing a book, we purchased tins of sardines in Brittany, I think in Concarneau or Douarnenez or somewhere along that beautiful west coast of France. Having read that tinned sardines improve with age, maturing slowing for upwards of years, I purchased some dozen tins and laid them down (like fine wine!). I came across that netted bag of rather ancient looking tins recently when cleaning out a cupboard, so they are probably upwards of 10-15 years old. Will they be sublime? Or possibly poisonous? Do I dare to sample?
Thanks and all best
Marc
Rachel; I’m pleased that you wrote this.
Over the years, my taste for sardines has increased from just tolerated to highly appreciated. I have them at least once a week, often as a light lunch, on toasted rye bread, with onion and tomato and a squeeze of lime juice (failing availability of lemons here.) and a few drops of bottled salsa picante.
Occasionally, I’ll have them for breakfast, perhaps with avocado spread on the toast. At this point, I prefer Vigilante brand Spanish sardines, packed on olive oil, but Calvo brand is fine. I’m less fond of those Mexican sardines in large, oval cans, packed in tomato sauce.
Back in the early ’70s, we used to buy the most delicious Smoked Norwegian Sprats at 49¢ a can, but over time, the price rose to ridiculous levels.
To sum up; not only do I enjoy the taste, but eating them makes me feel so damn healthy.
Saludos,
Don Cuevas
Rachel:
Wonderful article. After a lifetime of eating sardines (on toast in England as a lad, from the can when I was doing my PhD fieldwork in Belize in the 1970’s, and now mashed with garlic, parsley and olive oil), I thought I was an aficionado, but I hadn’t realized that they were commonly just young herrings from the northern seas.
Until a few years ago I’d never eaten a fresh sardine, and although the local variety in the Pacific Northwest isn’t to my taste, frozen sardines from Portugal (at least that’s where they’re packaged), cleaned, and grilled over charcoal have relegated sardines in a can to second (but still much-appreciated in my household) place.
I’m in Mexico for a few weeks; are there ANY local canned sardines that you might recommend?
Ian Hutchinson
A quick reply to Ian Hutchinson since his question is quick and direct. The main “sardine” sardina< appears to be Sardipos sagax according to the very useful by Arturo y Lila Lomelí, Del mar a su mesa (Grijalbo 1997). Yet I don’t remember seeing any canned sardines here labelled Mexican. Most seem to come from Norway, Portugal, the usual suspects. Or maybe it’s because like Don Cuevas I don’t usually buy the ones in tomato sauce in big oval cans.
Anyone know anything about a Mexican sardine canning industry? Now tuna for sure. What would mother’s do for quick after school snacks without tuna, saltines and pico de gallo?
Thanks to the other comments, there is another post I am brewing on sardines that pulls together another aspect of the whole story. Then more on pudding.
In terms of canned sardines the WHO gives these guidelines to the species that when canned can be called “sardines”. I’ve put the common names for the fresh fish in brackets for some.
Sardina pilchardus (Sardine/Pilchard)
• Sardinops melanostictus, S. neopilchardus (Australian sardine/Pilchard), S. ocellatus, S. sagax, S. caeruleus,
• Sardinella aurita, S. brasiliensis, S. maderensis, S. longiceps, S. gibbosa
• Clupea harengus (Herring)
• Clupea bentincki
• Sprattus sprattus (Sprat)
• Hyperlophus vittatus
• Nematalosa vlaminghi
• Etrumeus teres
• Ethmidium maculatum
• Engraulis anchoita, E. mordax, E. ringens
• Opisthonema oglinum
Nice, Rachel. Sardines are very, very popular here and elsewhere in Africa. They are generally economical, don’t turn bad as fresh fish – a tremendous plus where there is no refrigeration, don’t require cooking – also a great plus for folks who cook on wood and charcoal – and are liked for a variety of other reasons. They often form the protein ingredient for sauces that are used in eating various pates – made of maize, sorghum, or millet. Very economical.
Great Essay!!
More news on the Cornish Sardine;
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/dec/10/cornish-sardine-protected-eu
Lovely article. Each time I discover a new tinned sardine I like I look it up on the internet and that is how I found your article Rachel and have bookmarked it!
I am now living in Panama and found the Vigilante Sardine in Olive Oil to my liking. I mash them with potatoes and add chives. Yum yum to me although I’m sure some would find it disgusting.
Glad to find another sardine aficionado. I’m appalled that they are considered so low on the culinary scale in the US. I’m going to Panama next month and will look out for these.