Member-only story
Why You Should Eat Bread, Butter, and Anchovies This Season
More Americans can embrace the Italian go-to snack
Anchovies are key to umami notes in a Caesar dressing or salsa verde. They’ve whispered their flavor into sauces while olives and capers get all the credit. It’s high time they had their solo — ideally, on a piece of crusty bread slathered with nothing else but cultured butter.
The first time I had bread, butter, and anchovies, all other snacks ceased to exist. My mom and I were so taken with the antipasto at La Loggetta in Cortona, Tuscany — with its homey white-bread toast triangles, knobs of softened butter, and just-opened tin of Spanish fish — that we recreated it at home as often we could. Plates of the snack quickly replaced bowls of chips or cheese boards during happy hour, and when served with a side salad, it often became lunch or dinner altogether.
Like peanut butter and jelly, macaroni and cheese, or rice and beans, butter and anchovies is greater than the sum of its parts: There’s really no way to improve it beyond using the highest quality bread — something crusty works best — butter — cultured, unsalted is ideal because it adds…
