Having made it through the summer season with barely enough time to rub corn flour into the crack of my backside (chef thing) I can only apologize for my lack of posting.
Well I’m back, or at least that’s my intention.
I haven’t even cooked a meal for my family in nearly four months let alone had time to think about anything worth telling you about. That is until now.
Anchovies are something we Brits love to hate. Most people turn their noses up merely at the thought of the little salty things known almost exclusively as a pizza topping for the brave. Take a trip to Italy or Spain however and you will find a great love of the cured finger sized fish that come in all grades of quality.
Here in the restaurant on the Catalan coast we serve what we call the Rolls Royce of anchovies from Cantabria. At nearly 40€ a kilo they retail at 2.50 per fillet and are worth every penny. A far cry from most anchovies you might find in England which tend to be small and excessively salty, the ones from Cantabria measure around 10 to 15 cm and prepared correctly have just the right amount of salt to bring out the fishy flavour. Packed firmly in rock salt still on the bone they must be carefully filleted washed in fresh water, dried of excess water and marinated in a good olive oil for at least 48 hours before being ready to eat. WOW, as someone who gets to eat them regularly still the only way I can describe them to you is wow.
The only real ingredients in curing anchovies is salt and anchovies so I decided it can’t be that hard to have a go at home.
Without any research whatsoever I bought a handful of fresh “seitons” (as they are called here) removed their heads, gutted them and packed them in rock salt.
We have a vac pack machine here so I decided that was probably a good option and sealed them in. I can imagine that traditionally they were packed in wooded crates but that’s based on guess work rather than research.
I’m going to leave them for a few months as I am too impatient to leave them any longer, and maybe around Christmas or the kings celebration on the 6th January over here I’ll open them up wash them off and see how they are. I’ll keep you posted.
