Sardines are a popular snack in Hawaii and this recipe is adapted from the "Sardine Pupu" recipe in Cook Real Hawai'i by Sheldon Simeon. Olive oil, garlic, soy sauce, and apple cider vinegar come together in this easy and flavorful dish (it's almost adobo-esque!) Pour the sauce over the warmed sardines and enjoy. It's super ono.
Pupu is the word for snack or appetizer in Hawaii.
This is one super delicious pupu! It's saucy and bold in flavor. Savory! Tangy! I always forget just how delicious sardines are.
Enjoy this recipe hot as a solo snack. Eat with soda crackers (more on that below) or rice. There's no right or wrong way to eat this as long as you enjoy it ^_^
Cook Real Hawai'i
Cook Real Hawai'i is a new cookbook by Sheldon Simeon and Garrett Snyder. We received the book last week and it is beautiful. It's all about local food which makes my heart burst with a combo of happiness and excitement.
Simeon owns Tin Roof which is one of our go-to eating spots in Maui (it's super close to the airport and is often our first spot as soon as we land).
Many of the recipes will be familiar to anyone who grew up or has lived in Hawaii. Every local has their own specific food experience (eg. local Chinese will grow up eating different food from a local Filipino even though we're all local in Hawaii). It is super neat to see Simeon's version.
Why This Recipe Works
Simeon's Sardine Pupu recipe is winner (or as we say in Hawaii, a winnah!) Canned sardines are popular in Hawaii and everyone has their own way of preparing them.
My parents saute canned sardines with garlic and ton of onions plus a splash of fish sauce. We ate them with baguette (kind of like a banh mi). This seems like a part-local, part-Chinese, and part-Vietnamese way of preparing it.
Simeon's version calls for garlic and onions, but also soy sauce and apple cider vinegar. It's kind of like an adobo!
A quick and fast sardine adobo because the dish comes together in 10 minutes.
This dish is meant to be a snack. It's perfect with an iced cold drink. If I'm making this as a heartier snack or a light lunch, I'll eat it with soda crackers or a big bowl of rice.
*For soda crackers, the local Diamond Bakery ones are the best. You can buy small packages at Long Drugs or a big box from Costco Hawaii. They make many different fun flavors (savory and sweet), but for this recipe, you just want the plain soda crackers.
Ingredients
- Canned sardines in olive oil
- Sweet onion - If you're in Hawaii, look for sweet Maui onions...nothing compares ^_^
- Garlic - Feel free to double or triple the garlic, the more the merrier.
- Kochugaru - Commonly spelled as Gochugaru outside of Hawaii. These are Korean chili flakes.
- Soy sauce
- Apple cider vinegar
- Chili pepper water
- Fresh lemon
Step by Step Directions
Prepare the onions.
Place the sliced onions in a bowl. Cover with ice and then cold water. Set aside till the ice melts. The drain the onions and let dry on paper towels.
Saute oil, garlic, and kochugaru.
Open the can of sardines. Pour the olive oil from the can (hold back the sardines) into a small pan. Turn the stove to medium-high heat. Add the garlic and kochugaru. Saute for 2-3 minutes until browned and fragrant.
Add sardines.
Gently add in the sardines, keeping them whole. Cook for another minute (just enough to warm the sardines through), and then add in the soy sauce and apple cider vinegar.
Plate.
Remove the sardines onto a small plate. Pour the liquid (along with the garlic) from the skillet over the sardines. Add a splash of chili pepper water and squeeze the lemon on top.
Enjoy!
Eat and enjoy!
FAQs and Tips
Yes! Simeon's original recipe calls for 2 cans of sardines. I just use 1 can because I'm usually making this as a quick snack for one. But you can easily double or even triple the recipe.
Our adaptation simplifies the recipe a little. Here are the main changes we made:
- Simeon cooks down the soy sauce-apple cider vinegar sauce until there's no more liquid. We only cook down the sauce a tiny bit and then pour it over the sardines.
- After plating the sardines, Simeon adds a lot more chili pepper water. We added less because we have plenty of liquid/sauce from soy sauce-apple cider vinegar.
- Simeon drizzles homemade lemon olive oil at the end to finish the dish. We just squeezed half a fresh lemon over the dish.
Onions are perfect with sardines. You only see a few onion slices sprinkled on top of this dish. But right after I took the photo I added a ton more onions and mixed it up so that the onions also soak up that savory sauce. Oh man, it is ono!
Sardine Pupu Recipe
See below and enjoy ^_^
Sardine Pupu
Sardines are a popular snack in Hawaii and this recipe is adapted from the "Sardine Pupu" recipe in Cook Real Hawai'i by Sheldon Simeon. Olive oil, garlic, soy sauce, and apple cider vinegar come together in this easy and flavorful dish (it's almost adobo-esque!) Pour the sauce over the warmed sardines and enjoy. It's super ono.
Ingredients
- 1 can of sardines in olive oil
- ½ of a small sweet onion, thinly sliced into half-moons
- 3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 1 teaspoon kochugaru (Korean chili flakes)
- 2 teaspoons soy sauce
- 2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon chili pepper water
- ½ fresh lemon
Instructions
- Place the sliced onions in a bowl. Cover with ice and then cold water. Set aside till the ice melts. The drain the onions and let dry on paper towels.
- Open the can of sardines. Pour the olive oil from the can (hold back the sardines) into a small pan. Turn the stove to medium-high heat. Add the garlic and kochugaru. Saute for 2-3 minutes until browned and fragrant.
- Gently add in the sardines, keeping them whole. Cook for another minute (just enough to warm the sardines through), and then add in the soy sauce and apple cider vinegar.
- Remove the sardines onto a small plate. Pour the liquid (along with the garlic) from the skillet over the sardines. Add a splash of chili pepper water and squeeze the lemon on top. Eat and enjoy!
- P.S. We enjoy this dish plain as a snack but you can also eat it with soda crackers or rice.
Notes
Recipe adapted from Cook Real Hawai'i by Sheldon Simeon.
Can you substitute anchovies? Not a fan of sardines
This was amazing! I actually tripled the recipe for myself and my husband to have for dinner. I had plans to make bugna caulda, but my sardines were bad. My husband had just showed me a video of someone else making this meal. I searched and found your recipe and I'm so glad that I did. The original video we saw showed the guy eat it over a ton of onions, so I did cut two whole onions for it. Then I read where you sometimes eat it with rice, so I made jasmine rice. What a delicious meal! It was addictive and my husband and I will definitely be having this often! Thank you!
Aloha Dawn! Hooray and thank you for the kind words! I'm so happy you enjoyed the recipe, it's super good with a big bowl of rice 🙂
- Kathy
This was seriously delicious , I poured the whole pan over Omurice with extra chili oil and was taken to heaven. 10/10 this is going to be a new weekly meal.
Aloha Adam! So happy you enjoyed. I can imagine how super good this would be with omurice, love that idea ^_^
- Kathy
Yup; another great old school dish! My late wife used to make this all the time, and almost exactly the same way as your recipe. For me (before I married her) I was too lazy. I would just open up the can but leave a part of the lid still attached to the body of the can. Then I would just put it on the burner of the stove on low heat and just heat it up. I would eat it on rice with shoyu; that was about it! Another old school dish I used to make and love is to just open up a can of red salmon, and put sliced Kula onions on top and eat that with rice. Remember those days when a can of red salmon was super cheap?
Hi Alan! Ahaha I've heard about the cooking the sardines right in the can but never gave it a try! Am too chicken lolol. With rice and shoyu...sounds perfect. I remember when all these canned fishes and meats were considered cheap...nowadays even Spam is kind of pricey 🙂
- Kathy