Anchovy Lovers Unite!

I guess anchovies are like Vegemite - you either love it or hate it without much in between. Many is the time I have seen people picking these delightful little savory fish off their pizzas, shuddering as they did so. Quite inexplicably in my estimation.

So if you are an anchovy-averse person, move along, I assure you there is nothing here for you!

OK, is it just us anchophiles left? Good. I got to thinking about anchovies while looking up some recipes for a Provencal dinner tomorrow.

The recipes I am going to talk about can be made from the little flat tins one usually sees these particular comestibles marketed in, but for the most part it is better, not to say often much cheaper to source them in the larger bulk tins available at ethnic markets.



These delightful fishies come in two ways. They are often packed in oil (usually as filets) in which case you need only drain them to use them. They also come as salt pack, which I actually prefer, but it does mean that you need to spend more time rinsing them of salt as well as removing heads and backbones for some recipes. I shall omit other forms more suited to cocktail use like filets wrapped around a caper, though there is nothing better for munchies - they just aren't that useful for cooking.

The best basic use, aside from laying filets on various things like pizza, is as a spread from southern France known as anchoiade.

Take a flat tin, drain it and drop the fish into a large mortar with a couple of cloves of garlic and a small amount of wine vinegar, and grind it up, adding olive oil to get to the right consistency, anywhere from chunky to smooth. Spread it on toasted bagguette slices and top with half an olive or a sliver of pimento and you are set - open that Rhone and away you go. It also freezes reasonably well.

If this sounds like another (of my favourite) recipe, tapenade, made from olives, you are right. Tapenade involves mixing up (the lazy or hurried can use a food processor) the following (or mutliples thereof):

1 clove garlic, chopped
1 3/4 cups whole, pitted kalamata olives
1 (2 ounce) can anchovy fillets, rinsed
2 tablespoons capers
1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary
3 tablespoons lemon juice
4 tablespoons olive oil

You end up with a less anchovy more olive and herb based spread that can be used in exactly the same way. I like to add a handful of fresh Italian broadleaf parsley, but there are many variations, all delightful.

I make a rather nice, if I do say so myself, pissaladierre using a layer of anchoiade on the bottom of the crust with sauteed onions on top dotted with olives. That makes a nice change from the more familiar pizza appearance that the usual laying on of anchovy strips makes with this dish.


So get out there, dig those Raunchy Rhones out of the cellar and serve up some of them fishies - and if anyone else has any favourite recipes that are centred around anchovies, please post them!

10:1 you'll get some responses similar to "I don't eat anchovies." We'll see how well your "move along" works. I may use it in some of my threads.

TAPENADE

1/2 pound green olives, with pimentos
1/2 pound black olives, Kalamata
1 small can of anchovies
4-6 pepperoncini – remove stems
2-3 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons capers
1/2 cup olive oil

Put all ingredients into the food processor. Using the pulse button, process until coarsely chopped and well blended. Continue to process, slowly adding the olive oil. Refrigerate in a covered container. Spread on toasted, crusty Italian bread.

[Robin Garr]

Mark me as an anchovy lover. I can eat them straight out of the can, and I love them on pizza.

Perhaps the simplest use, though - most of us probably know this - is to simply crush a couple in with the garlic and oil with a few red-pepper flakes in your sauteeing medium. It contributes a mysterious salty flavor, and people usually can't guess what it is.

Perhaps the simplest use, though - most of us probably know this - is to simply crush a couple in with the garlic and oil with a few red-pepper flakes in your sauteeing medium. It contributes a mysterious salty flavor, and people usually can't guess what it is.

Yes, it is interesting how they will simply melt into a pasta sauce in the pan and add a slightly fishy slightly salty 'je ne sais quoi' to the end result.

As for tapenades, I am always tempted to double the anchovy component and end up with something in between anchoiade and tapenade. I also like using basil as well as thyme or rosemary.

Hmm - maybe I should stage a 'dip-off' some time - make up 3 - 4 different versions and get some volunteer tasters to tell me if it is better with this herb or that, do capers make the difference, is it nicer with more or less added anchovy.....and of course the panelists would need some large glasses of Gigondas to cleanse their palates between tastes, right?

Another way to use anchovies.

In the summer when my tomatoes are at full harvest, I begin making my roasted tomato sauce. I've posted this before, but here it is again:

Fill up a sheet pan full of unskinned tomato chunks. Cherry types, I cut in half, large toms I quarter and cut the quarters in half. I try to keep all chunks the same size. I use whatever color, or type are ripe. Be sure to line your sheet pan with the "Release" type of foil wrap. Sprinkle toms with EVOO, then coarse salt and freshly ground pepper. In one corner of the pan, near the oven door, put one whole garlic bulb, which you have cut the top off to expose the garlic. Sprinkle with EVOO, s & p. Put into a 375° oven and roast until the tomatoes begin to turn brown and caramelize. Take out the garlic bulb after the cloves become soft, and before they burn.
Squeeze the cloves out of the skins into your food processor. Add the roasted tomatoes and one or two anchovy fillets with a little of the oil. Whirl away until smooth. Put into one cup containers and freeze. These freeze up to two years. This is the best tomato sauce ever.
We use it on our pizzas. It makes a great pasta sauce, by adding sautéed onion and what ever else you want. I sometimes add pancetta. Sometimes my sauce is so thick, (if I use Roma type toms) that I mark it as tomato paste.
Note - if you are not used to cooking with anchovies, I'd add only one anchovy fillet to your sauce to start with.

Perhaps the simplest use, though - most of us probably know this - is to simply crush a couple in with the garlic and oil with a few red-pepper flakes in your sauteeing medium. It contributes a mysterious salty flavor, and people usually can't guess what it is.

Puttanesca!

Count me among the lovers! I hardly ever order a salad in an Italian restaurant that I don't ask to add anchovies. I'm definitely going to try these recipes. I've never seen these anchovies. I do have a couple Mediterranean markets I shop -- will definitely need to look for these. Thx, guys.

I guess I am a 'truth in advertising' nut (read, curmudgeon).

I have actually rejected a Caesar salad that had no anchovies in it. Told the restaurant if they wanted to list a Caesar salad on their menu it had a specific meaning, that was what I had ordered and if produced something different then a) they should call it some other name, and b) they could keep it.

At least with such miscegenations as 'low fat bacon' (i.e. tofu strips) the name gives a hint that you aren't getting the original 'recipe'.

The Agostini, the pink can on the left in the photo in your first post, is actually about my favorite brand. It is odd that anchovies packed in salt end up tasting LESS salty when washed off than most of the anchovies packed in oil.

There is a famous green sauce that they make in Piemonte which is mainly anchovies ground up with a lot of flat Italian parsley and some oil. Delicious and simple stuff.

Frank

Frank - that is classic salsa verde (not that Mexican imposter of the same name that uses tomatillos.

Salsa Verde
INGREDIENTS
15g Flatleaf Parsley Leaves (Chopped)
5g Chopped Mint Leaves
3 tablespoons Capers
6 Anchovy Fillets (Drained)
1 Crushed Garlic Clove

Use mortar or food processor and you get a great sauce for meats, fish (nice with salmon) and a killer addition to new potatoes, hot or cold!

PS - pet peeve.

Unless it is clearly out of the question, why do recipes require 'X anchovies'? Why not have the recipe call for 'one tin of anchovy filets' and then tailor the rest of the ingredients around that?

What in blazes does one do with a half a tin of anchovies left over from a recipe? I'd rather double the recipe and freeze the leftover sauce, dip, whatever. The same sort of dilemma pertains with all the recipes that ask for '1 tbs. tomato paste' and then you have most of a tin left over until the next time you might need some. That one we solve by finding a use in the proximate future or freezing it in an ice cube tray and then bagging it.

And while I am at it, another fave occurs to me - anyone like Bagna Cauda, which is basically a hot sauce made from oil, butter, garlic and anchovy. That is the absolute best argument for pulling out those long-disused fondue sets I know.

I guess anchovies are like Vegemite - you either love it or hate it without much in between. Many is the time I have seen people picking these delightful little savory fish off their pizzas, shuddering as they did so. Quite inexplicably in my estimation.

My favorite snack is a can of anchovies and soda crackers, but my wife can't stand them. I put anchovies in a lot of my dishes and just don't tell her they're in there, she hasn't caught me yet. Oh yeah, I just polished off my jar of Vegemite this morning. -RP

I just polished off my jar of Vegemite this morning. -RP

I tried Vegemite just once. Found I couldn't get the same sheen I got using my usual shoe polish...

OTOH, I don't mind (but also don't seek out) another 'Gentleman's Relish' prepared with anchovies, Patum Peperium.

I just polished off my jar of Vegemite this morning. -RP

I tried Vegemite just once. Found I couldn't get the same sheen I got using my usual shoe polish...

OTOH, I don't mind (but also don't seek out) another 'Gentleman's Relish' prepared with anchovies, Patum Peperium.

LOL, it is definitely an acquired taste, but spread thin on some buttered toast, its really good.

We're heavy anchovy users. I'm not a fan of the little tins, they're a mess to save. We buy larger jars- sometimes salt-packed, but easier to find are oil-packed. Large jar with a hinged glass lid with a gasket around edge (like Grolsch beer).

[Robin Garr]

Puttanesca!

That's a classic application, Jeff, but the same approach can be used in just about any Italian dish that starts with sauteeing garlic.

[Robin Garr]

So if you are an anchovy-averse person, move along, I assure you there is nothing here for you!

Hey, the spell is actually working! I can't believe we haven't had anyone pop into this thread with "EEEUUWWW! ICK! HAIRY LITTLE FISH!"

Hey, the spell is actually working! I can't believe we haven't had anyone pop into this thread with "EEEUUWWW! ICK! HAIRY LITTLE FISH!"

Well don't forget jenise is away..... (she probably likes them anyway).

Yes, it is interesting how they will simply melt into a pasta sauce in the pan and add a slightly fishy slightly salty 'je ne sais quoi' to the end result.

As for tapenades, I am always tempted to double the anchovy component]and end up with something in between anchoiade and tapenade. I also like using basil as well as thyme or rosemary.

Hmm - maybe I should stage a 'dip-off' some time - make up 3 - 4 different versions and get some volunteer tasters to tell me if it is better with this herb or that, do capers make the difference, is it nicer with more or lessadded anchovy.....and of course the panelists would need some large glasses of Gigondas to cleanse their palates between tastes, right?

Bill, why don't you make up a gallon or so of each of these, and bring them to Mo'Cool, along with a 6 pack of on theme wines. Give the tapanade(s) to Alan Kerr our Mo'Cool chef deluxe, and point out your wine to me so that I don't miss any of them.

I like to add a couple anchovies to ratatouille. I think they add some weight to the stew. The leftovers can always go on a pizza or into a tapanade.

Bill, why don't you make up a gallon or so of each of these, and bring them to Mo'Cool, along with a 6 pack of on theme wines. Give the tapanade(s) to Alan Kerr our Mo'Cool chef deluxe, and point out your wine to me so that I don't miss any of them.

Uh, that's in Detroit, isn't it?

Bit too far inland for me to venture I'm afraid. Of course if you happen to get out to the we(s)t coast and offer yourself for tasting, I'm sure something could be arranged.

These would be killer with some really good Tavel......

Left over anchovies can be put in a small jar, covered with olive oil and will keep, without refrigeration, for several weeks. Left over tomato paste needs a little more care. Wipe the sides of the tin above the paste, then cover with at least ¼ inch of olive oil. This will keep in the fridge for many weeks.

definitely an anchovy lover here....
I really like the ones packed in salt, but they are difficult for me to find here.

On the rare occasion I use them on pizza, it's just sauce and anchovy, no cheese. That will usually induce a two day beer drinking binge.

I use them most often in spaghetti aglia olio, but every once in a while, I'll ramp up the anchovy content in the garlic oil, and turn it into an anchovy sauce. Seems to work well in hot weather for me, not sure why.