The great anchovy debate

Spot the Ortiz anchovy

Jak simply asked the deli for a tin of anchovies. Dumbfounded by the cost she paid the extra $15.75 and brought them home slightly perplexed.
I was mildly interested having been following the debate between Neil and Rebecca on the expense and finer points of Ortiz anchovies.
What amazes me about these beasts is that the cost of a tin in the market can vary by over $2 – that’s almost the cost of a regular tin of these slippery little beasties.
Out of academic interest I bought another tin myself because I reckon I have found on the shelves of Coles the best alternative.
So what do you get for $15? It’s an attractive cardboard box and tin containing nine cured fillets weighing 30 grams (47.5 grams with the olive oil), which apparently is two portions. That’s about $1.75 an anchovy or 52.5 cents a gram, about $525 a kilo.
I tried two other brands of anchovy including John West, which were the most salty and bony of the lot. Quite nasty really.

Ortiz in action
The nearest alternative to Ortiz is the somewhat perplexingly branded Always Fresh. I say perplexing because of the bastardisation of the word fresh. In today’s marketing speak Always Fresh is far more likely to be a panty liner or deodorant than food. The other thing that troubles me about this name is that these anchovies obviously aren’t fresh. They are tinned and preserved.
For little more than $2 we get 27 grams of anchovy, which is apparently enough for three servings. They come in a fairly unattractive and unimaginative packaging which sort of sums up the location of importer Riviana Foods – 5 Corporate Avenue.
According to a story this week in Epicure in The Age, Ortiz anchovies are processed within eight hours of being caught. I also understand – and this could be a myth – that the bones are removed with tweezers.
I agree with the Epicure article that the Ortiz should score 9/10. But I would rank the Always Fresh at 8/10.
The only difference I could really make out was that the Ortiz were slightly longer.
So if you are one of those Big Swinging Dicks (not you Rebecca), you will probably want to opt for the longer and more expensive anchovy and transport them in the glove compartment of your full strength Porsche.
I am happy to accept that smaller and cheaper is sometime better and transport them home by foot.

Food fascist
I’d love to hear how much Ortiz anchovies cost in Europe, Spain in particular. The Australian dollar (aka the Pacific peso) is equal to about 0.6 Euros. That means we are paying the equivalent of about 9 Euros for a 47 gram tin.