Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 59.djvu/565

Rh cooking of the fish is completed; (2) the bones are softened; (3) the bacteria in the oil and fish are killed; (4) the presence of leaks in the cans is disclosed. After cooling, the cans are placed in dry sawdust and stirred from time to time; this absorbs the oil and moisture on the surface, and renders the cans, clean and ready for packing.

The sardine manufacturers ostensibly employ only two kinds of oil in their canning operations—olive oil and arachide or peanut oil. Native olive oil is used with the best quality of sardines. Fish packed in it will remain in good condition ten years or longer, and are reported to be better the second year after packing than earlier. Arachide oil i? extensively employed. It is made in Bordeaux, Fecamp and Marseilles from peanuts imported from India, Senegal and other parts of Africa, and other countries. It comes in three grades, the best quality costing less than one-third as much as the best olive oil. Peanut oil is largely used to meet the American demand for a low-priced sardine. Most of the cheaper French sardines exported to America are packed in peanut oil, which is practically tasteless. While it is reported that the manufacturers knowingly handle only the oils named, it is understood that cottonseed oil, being tasteless and cheap, is used by the French oil-dealers for adulterating both olive and peanut oils. A canner may fry his sardines in peanut oil and fill the cans with olive oil, or vice versa; or one oil, with or without the admixture of cottonseed oil, may be used throughout the process.

There are various other ingredients with which or in which the sardines are packed to give them flavor or piquancy. Some of the very best goods are prepared with melted butter instead of oil; these are mostly for special French trade. Tomato sauce, pickles and truffles are also used. With most of the oil sardines a small quantity of spices is added in order to impart a flavor. The usual ingredients for each can are 1 or 2 cloves, quarter or half of a laurel leaf, and a small piece of thyme; these are put in the can before the fish, so that they will be on top when the can is opened. The fresh leaves of tarragon are sometimes used.

Americans need hardly be told that French sardines, when of the best quality, have a flavor and richness which make them preferable to the sardines prepared on the Atlantic coast of the United States from the young of the sea herring. French sardines of average grade, even when canned in peanut and cottonseed oil, are superior in palatability to the great bulk of the American output; while the cheaper grades of French sardines—which unfortunately find a ready market in the United States—are certainly not preferable to much of the native pack.

The conditions which underlie the general superiority of the French canned sardines, and the steps which may be followed in America for