Serves 4 as a snack.
Ingredients
4 slices rusticco bread
2 tablespoons soft butter
1 tin (about 4 ounces) good-quality deboned sardines, packed in olive oil
1/2 lemon
Coarse sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon finely diced red onion
Directions
Preheat broiler. Toast the bread until golden brown and crisp.
When the bread is still warm but not hot (you don’t want the butter to melt), butter each slice.
Top with the sardines (you can either neatly layer them on the toast or mash them up in a bowl and spread them).
Sprinkle with lemon juice, a little bit of the oil from the sardine can, the salt, pepper and onions.
Serve immediately.
(Note: My wife likes to add the additional, decadent touch of a squiggle of Japanese mayonnaise, usually made with cider vinegar or rice vinegar instead of distilled vinegar and available at Asian markets, on those toasts, which is delicious.)
