Chargrilled Sardine Pieces in Spicy Pickled Sauce

Güeyu Mar is one of the most extraordinary conservas producers in Spain — a project born from the legendary Asturian beachside restaurant of the same name, where chef Abel Alvarez built a global reputation for cooking fish and seafood over open wood fire on the Cantabrian shore. This tin takes the same Cantabrian sardines and the same holm oak-roasted approach as the rest of the range, and then turns up the heat.

The sardine pieces are chargrilled over holm oak before being packed in an escabeche-style marinade of Arbequina extra virgin olive oil from Castillo de Canena, apple cider vinegar, onion, paprika, and spices — and finished with habanero pepper, which brings a fruity, fierce heat that sets this tin apart from the rest of the Güeyu Mar range. The habanero is one of the hottest and most aromatic chillies in the world: its heat is sharp and immediate, but it carries a distinctive tropical fruitiness that works surprisingly well with the acidity of the escabeche and the smokiness of the sardines. The result is a tin with genuine complexity and real fire — not heat for its own sake, but heat that adds a dimension. Serve with good bread and a cold glass of Albarino.