Best Canned Sardines

Sliced tomatoes with red onion, parsley, extra virgin olive oil, salt/pepper/dried oregano and canned sardines in olive oil with homemade roasted peppers

Best Canned Sardines

We love, high quality, canned fish and we think they are one of the culinary world’s secret weapons, especially when a home cook doesn’t have access to a wide variety of fresh fish.  In fact, in our book we’d rather consume superb salt/olive oil cured sardines, anchovies, tuna, etc. than a fresh fish like Talapia any day of the week. We recently enjoyed a can of olive oil cured Sardines from, of all places, Trader Joe’s!  The sardines were full of meaty flavor and paired very well with our homemade roasted peppers.  We also broke down and purchased a few locally grown  ”greenhouse” tomatoes (at a separate market) because we needed to believe that summer was just around the corner (the tomatoes were average, but the roasted peppers and canned sardines were tremendous).  We’ve sampled many variants of canned sardines and the very best have the following traits:

• Packed in olive oil and/or salt
• Contain no other added ingredient(s)
• Usually derive from Spain, Portugal, Poland, Morocco, or Italy

• Matiz Gallego (Spain)
• Idamar (Portugal)
• Gonsalves (Portugal)
• Da Morgada (Portugal)
• As Do Mar
• Trader Joe’s Sardines in Olive Oil
• Crown Prince
• King Oscar
• Brunswick

Our favorite way to enjoy canned sardines are along side olives, tomatoes, cheese, roasted peppers, bread, salumi, etc.  During the summer months, we’ll prepare sliced tomatoes with extra virgin olive oil, dried oregano, basil, and salt and dress the sardines alongside the tomatoes with additional extra virgin olive and maybe a few very thinly sliced red onions (no need for salt, pepper, or dried oregano).  Good bread is also a requirement.