Anchovies

The silver anchovy, once so plentiful in the waters surrounding the peninsula and the islands of Italy that as a child I could catch a hundred of them simply by scooping my bucket through the water, is preserved in sea salt to add a salty, surprising non-fishy taste to all kinds of dishes from sauces for pasta to roast Iamb. They are popular in the north of the country too, in particular in landlocked Piemonte, where finding fresh fish used to be too challenging a prospect and thus the evolution of dishes using preserved fish has taken place over time.