Searches for ‘tinned fish’ are spiking on Google, and TikTok is awash with tinned fish date nights, tinned fish reviews and ‘sea-cuterie’ boards of tinned seafood.

Our love for tinned fish started to grow during lockdown. Since it’s mostly made overseas, this was travel in a can when we couldn’t leave the house. Tinned fish’s move from daggy to delicacy was also helped by the fact it’s a cheap, shelf-stable product that’s perfect for the cost-of-living crisis. It’s only gone from strength to strength since then.

Now the tinned fish revolution is everywhere. The colourful packaging found on tins of sardines and anchovies has turned them into some sort of cult item, with tinned fish labels now popping up in fashion and homeware design.

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I’ve been slow to adopt tinned sardines in ways other than just smashed on toast, but now I love them broken over large fried croutons of stale sourdough with chunks of the ripest, fattest tomatoes, capers, parsley and finely sliced red onion. Swap the bread for Dakos barley rusks to make a tinned fish version of Greece’s famous Naxos salad (which is where I stole the idea from). Or you could step up the classic sardines on toast and pop the fillets on crispy bread loaded with tomato, parsley and chilli, like they used to make at Queensland’s Hellenika. Other tasty uses are to flake sardines into your puttanesca sauce, or make a salad of sardines, fresh celery, herbs and cannellini beans.

It should be no surprise that I have far more love for good tinned anchovies. Something happened when we began to realise that the ugly grey brutes on top of old-school suburban pizzas were nothing compared to premium delicate blushing fillets, loaded with a little sweetness amongst all that umami. Chefs like Andrew McConnell putting the cans as a starter on the menu at Cumulus Inc. also helped change attitudes. Now I’ll use good, canned anchovies mashed in a pecorino dressing over crisp red witlof or green beans; or drape pink Cantabrian fillets over milky burrata with black olives. Feel fancy? How about a modern manchego custard like they used to do at La Salut in Redfern, served with an anchovy fillet and nugget of tomato.

I have always thought that canned smoked oysters and mussels were cool, and I’ll happily go toe-to-toe with anyone who disagrees. Butter-tossed smoked mussels poured over mash or pasta is a perfect 10-minute dinner. Or make a cheat’s version of Nomad’s smoked mussels with a garlic toum and Espelette pepper on a hash brown.

The new ‘cool’ of tinned fish isn’t just about the fancy packaging. There has also been a marked improvement in both the quality of the seafood and the flavourings used. Now you can find everything from rainbow trout, Galician octopus and garfish popping up along with horse mackerel, herrings and even cod livers sold as “foie gras of the sea”. Meanwhile, exotic flavours range from French cans of mackerel in a mustard sauce, Chinese fried dace with salted black beans, or a very Japanese combo of yuzu and grated daikon with the grilled dark fleshed oily sanma (Pacific saury) fish. Try them, and see if this new wave of tinned seafood is the key to your next great meal!

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