Sardines – the can decides after four questions
When it comes to sardines, "nur Gutes" offers everything from oil-packed sardines from Matosinhos to vintage tins from the Vendée, sourced from houses like Pinhais, Gonidec, and La Perle des Dieux. Everywhere they are produced, every fish is placed in the can by hand—steamed in Portugal, fried in Brittany.
Sardines are small herring-like fish from the Atlantic and the Mediterranean that are packed in cans with olive oil or tomato sauce, either whole with skin and soft bones or as fillets. Anchovies, on the other hand, are different, slimmer fish that are known in their salted form.
The sardine only has enough fat for the can in high summer
The sardine travels through the ocean in silvery, large schools, from the North Atlantic to the coast of Senegal and throughout the entire Mediterranean, never exceeding a length of just under thirty centimeters. Off the coast of Portugal, it spawns between February and April, and after that, the fish must build up fat before it is worth canning.
In April, the sardine only has two to three percent fat. For the vintage tins from La Perle des Dieux, it needs to be more than twelve percent, a level the fish reaches from midsummer onwards. Jakob Glatz, who runs the Pinhais manufactory in Matosinhos, therefore waits until September. That is when the sardines are at their largest and carry the fat required for a good tin.
Handcraft begins with the catch, and it differs from coast to coast. In Matosinhos, the fish is washed in hundred-year-old basins, placed on racks, and steamed slowly, one by one, tin by tin. Afterward, the women of the manufactory place the fish into olive oil, and at the end, the finished tin is wrapped in yellow paper, also folded by hand.
In Concarneau and Quiberon, however, the sardine goes into the frying pan. At Gonidec, it first rests in brine, which descales and firms up the fish, before around forty workers behead them. Dried and fried, it is placed in the tin head-to-tail, tête-bêche, as they say in Brittany. Anyone who places both tins side-by-side on bread will taste the difference, and both coasts have their devoted followers.
Four tins on a board, from Portugal, Brittany, and the Vendée
In the evenings, four tins sit side-by-side on the apéro board: one in yellow paper from Portugal, a painted one from the Vendée, one with tomato sauce, and one with chili—each one deserving its own slice of bread. This is how we have curated our shelf, from three coasts and a few neighbors, with a different tin for every evening.
We selected the sardines from Portugal from Pinhais in Matosinhos, whose oil-packed sardines have been traveling the world under the Nuri brand since 1935. From the same port comes Porthos, the oldest brand of the house Portugal Norte, which has been canning fish in Matosinhos since 1912. A Banca da Sardinha from Lisbon packs its sardines in seventeen different recipes, ranging from pure olive oil to the heat of Malagueta chili.
José Gourmet has its tins designed by Portuguese illustrators. The small sardines there are called petingas, a word worth remembering because the tender fish in the tin look exactly as the word sounds.
The larger part of the shelf is filled with sardines from Brittany and the Vendée. From Quiberon comes la belle-iloise with its Saint-Georges recipe in olive oil, and from the same port, La Quiberonnaise. Les Mouettes d'Arvor from the Conserverie Gonidec hail from Concarneau, and La Perle des Dieux, with its vintage editions, comes from Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie. At 115 grams, the French tin is slightly smaller than the 125-gram Portuguese one.
In addition, we have chosen Ortiz from Ondarroa in the Basque Country, where every sardine is cleaned by hand before being fried in olive oil, as well as Pollastrini from Italy. Things get spicy with Piri-Piri at Nuri, with chili at la belle-iloise and La Perle des Dieux, with Malagueta at A Banca da Sardinha, and with Habanero at La Quiberonnaise. For those who love the frying pan, you will also find raw sardines in butter, intended for searing.
Oil or tomato, young or vintage, and the tin is on the table
You choose canned sardines based on four questions: oil or tomato, with or without bones, young or vintage, Portugal or Brittany. At "nur Gutes," there is a tin on the shelf for every answer. Sardines in olive oil come out of the tin clear and salty-fresh, and belong on bread or an apéro board. In tomato sauce, the fish lies soft in a fruity sauce; this is the tin for pasta, rice, and a quick evening meal.
The bone of a whole sardine is soft after cooking and is eaten along with the fish; boneless fillets are also available. "Young" means firm to the bite and bright in oil; "vintage" means time. The tin ages like a good wine, is turned every six months so that the oil covers both sides of the fish, and can be kept for up to ten years.
Portugal steams its sardines and packs them with olive oil, tomato, or Piri-Piri. Brittany fries them and also uses peanut oil, butter, and marinades. The price follows the vintage, and with four answers, the tin chooses itself.
Those who choose tomato will find sardines in tomato sauce from Nuri, Porthos, A Banca da Sardinha, and José Gourmet, with or without chili. For an evening table with children, this is the perfect tin to start with. Anyone standing before the shelf for the first time should place a steamed tin from Matosinhos next to a fried one from Quiberon; after the first slice of bread, you will know which coast is your own.
With us, "boneless" means fillets without skin and bones, in oil, with lemon, or in tomato, from la belle-iloise, A Banca da Sardinha, Briosa, and La Perle des Dieux. In the vintage tins from the Vendée, time takes care of the deboning. Over the years, the central bone melts into the meat to the point where it is barely detectable.
The vintage sardines carry their harvest year on the lid and, depending on the year, reveal notes of avocado, butter, or something nutty. After three to four years, the flesh is tender and velvety, the saltiness softened, and the oil darker. If you want to start with a vintage, take the youngest from the Vendée; it shows where it all begins, and the older one next to it costs a bit more because it has already lived through the years.
Where the sardine is still placed in the tin fish by fish
In the hall of Pinhais on the Avenida Menéres in Matosinhos, almost only women sit at the tables. They have been placing the sardines into the cans one by one for over a hundred years, and since 2016, the manufactory in Matosinhos has belonged to the Viennese Glatz family.
Jakob Glatz, who runs the Viennese house in the fourth generation, sticks to the long process—about three times as many steps as for a tin from the supermarket. The fish continues to arrive at the hall directly from the port, where it is selected piece by piece.
In Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie on the coast of the Vendée, the Gendreau family has been working with sardines for four generations. Philippe Gendreau founded the La Perle des Dieux brand in 2005 and made the vintage tin its core. The sardinières, as the women at the tables there are called, sort, trim, and place each sardine by hand.
The picture on the lids changes every year, painted by artists. Thus, the Conserverie in the Vendée tells a different story with each vintage: a family in a boat off the coast one year, a woman with a flower wreath the next.
Georges Hilliet was 22 when he opened his factory on the quay of Port-Maria in 1932, a young man from a family of sailors and fishmongers in a port town that boasted fourteen canneries at the time. The house is called la belle-iloise today; Caroline Hilliet Le Branchu, his granddaughter, has taken it over, and the sardine in peanut oil, with which it all began, remains.
At the same port, Henriette Jourdan had already founded La Quiberonnaise in 1921, and their principle holds true to this day: no more than two days after the catch, the fish is prepared by hand and put into the tin, often in peanut oil.
And in Concarneau, Gonidec stands as the city's last conserverie. Jacques Gonidec founded it in 1959 with his parents and named his brand Les Mouettes d'Arvor after his soccer club. Anyone who has walked through such a hall—amidst hot oil, salt, and the women lining up the fish—will see a tin differently afterwards.
From the tin to bread, into pasta, and into the hot pan
The simplest cuisine in the world begins with you opening the tin and not pouring away the oil. At Pinhais and La Perle des Dieux, the fish lies in pure olive oil, which is worth putting on bread. So, dip a piece of sourdough into it, add a few drops of lemon and some coarse salt. Bring the tin to the table at room temperature; that is when the oil and fish show themselves as they should be.
Flaked, the oil-packed sardine lands in spaghetti with garlic, parsley, and a spoonful of its oil. Or it lies on a salad of tomatoes, red onions, and capers, where the oil replaces the dressing. A good olive oil from the shelf next door extends the sauce when the tin is empty, and the tomato tin combined with rice makes for a dinner that requires no preparation.
For the frying pan, we have selected sardines for frying, raw-packed in butter, with lemon and cilantro, with tomato pistou, or with garlic and Piment d'Espelette, the fine chili from the French Basque country. You tip the tin into a hot pan, a few minutes per side, and the kitchen smells as if you were standing on the quay of Quiberon. Serve with a baguette and a lukewarm salad with fennel, and leave the window open.
The bones stay in; they are as much a part of the sardine as the skin. Such a tin can wait in the cupboard for years; a vintage even continues to mature, and you turn it over every now and then. Once opened, cover the remainder and keep it in the refrigerator.
With a supply of three or four varieties, your kitchen cupboard is ready for any guest—for a Friday night with bread and wine or a Sunday picnic. The painted vintage tin also serves as a great small gift, and no one has to open it that same evening.
The season opens in spring, and the vintage enters the tin from midsummer
Portugal reopens its sardine season every spring, most recently on May 4, 2026, after the nets had been closed for sardines since the beginning of December. The catch volume is limited and managed jointly with Spain, and since the fishing bans, stocks have recovered. Off the coast of Brittany, the sardine appears with the onset of spring, and from summer into autumn, the factories in Quiberon and Concarneau are in full operation.
When the fatty September fish is in the tins, the waiting begins at the vintage houses. When the new vintage arrives with us, it takes its place on the shelf next to the older ones. For an advent calendar, a Santa boot, or a gift table, such a tin is a present that gains value from year to year. And on June 13, when Lisbon grills sardines for Santo António, the tin is welcome to join you on the balcony.
In front of the sardine shelf in our store at Bosinks Kamp in Nordhorn, the conversation often begins with a holiday, a port, and a tin that one has been looking for ever since. Portugal or Brittany—that is usually decided by memory rather than product knowledge. Everything else is just bread, a knife, and a tin that can be opened. The rest is the Atlantic.
