Recipe:

Brine sardines in a 10% salt solution for 48 hours. Shorter than this and the fish turn out mushy, longer and they're too salty.

Rinse brine off, put fish in a jar with ~65% vinegar solution and whatever spices you like. I use bay, onion, pepper and junpier.

Wait 4 days before eating. Obviously it needs to be kept in the fridge.

I've never had these but I think I would love them. At least here though it's very very very tough to find sardines fresh enough to cook with, so I'm more likely just to roast them with olive oil and garlic when I do.

Quite a treat when you do. Here you might see them frozen in shops but be careful - they're so so high in polyunsaturated fatty acids that they go rancid quickly even when frozen!

It works with other fish too. I only use sardines because I don't have access to herring.

Herring and sardine are basically the same fish but one prefers cool, other warm, and they share waters between. My local market I can get either as whole fresh fish for about 6.50€/kg. Worth checking out as you likely have one of them depending where you live in the world.

I actually just get them for my dogs because they're abundant, cheap, yummy, and with high protein and omega-3.

Sounds delicious 😋

It has to be refrigerated? I thought a major point of pickling food was for preservation. Why can't you just keep it in the pantry?

It does preserve the food. My pickled onions keep for about a month in the fridge, which they wouldn't if not pickled. But long life does not mean impossible to spoil.

Are you not sealing the jar? All the canning and pickling I've ever seen makes things keep for years.

How do you destroy anisakis? do you freeze it beforehand?

The fish have been frozen before I buy them. I can't be 100% confident that it's below -20, but there's only ever been 1 documented case of anisakis in my country so it's a risk I'm willing to take.

no, home canning of meat is really not a good idea due to risk of botulism.

It's raw fish. I don't care how it's been prepared, I'm not storing it at room temperature.

Never heard of this book, but now I have it looks like something I definitely want.

It's pretty good book. It does lack on recipes(it has some) but it has a lot of information on tools, process, science and history. Even if you don't make anything it's still a good read.

Edit: Here's the contents.

This looks amazing. Will you eat them on crackers?

nah, either on toast or with rice.

Oh I love these and pickled mackerel. Oh and anchovies in olive oil too.