Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 October 1903 — Sardines. [ARTICLE]

Sardines.

Genuine sardines are the young of the pilchard. Their name comes from the fact that they are most numerous off the coast of Sardinia. They swim in the spring in shoals containing millions—fish shaped shoals ten miles long and a half mile wide. The sardines are netted and taken at once to the shore. There they are washed, scraped and sprinkled with salt. The salt Is soon removed, the heads and gills cut off and there is another washing. Then, on beds of green brush, the fish are dried in the sun. Next they are boiled in olive oil till cooked thoroughly. The packers—women always—take them now and pack them in the tin boxes we all know, filling up each box with boiling oil, fitting on the lid and making the box air tight by soldering the joints together with a jet of hot steam. Sardines are more or less perfect according as they are prepared more or less immediately after their capture and according as the oil they are packed in is more or less pare.