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A tinned fish renaissance

6/10/202639 min

We launched a Patreon! Become an Outside/Insider for just $5 per month, and you can get AD-FREE episodes of the podcast, plus access to behind-the-scenes blog posts and more. Sardines are in vogue. Literally. They are in Vogue magazine. They’re delicious (subjectively), good for you, and sustainable… right?  Recently, a listener called into the show asking about just that. “I've always had this sense that they're a more environmentally friendly fish, perhaps because of being low on the food chain. But I'm realizing I really have no sense of what it looks like to actually fish for sardines,” Jeannie told us. The Outside/In team got together to look beyond the sunny illustrations on the fish tins. Is there bycatch? What about emissions? Are sardines overfished? If we care about the health of the ocean, can we keep eating sardines? This episode was originally published in 2025.  Featuring Jeannie Bartlett, Malin Pinsky, and Zach Koehn. Rip logo photo: Canned seafood by Jack Kennard (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0). Produced by Justine Paradis. For full credits and transcript, visit outsideinradio.org. SUPPORT Outside/In is made possible with listener support. Click here to join our Patreon and get ad-free episodes of the podcast. Follow Outside/In on Instagram or join our private discussion group on Facebook. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Clips

Catching Sardines, Netting Whales
Fast Fish Still Collapse
Sardines Are Swimming Sunlight
Sardines Beat Nuts on Carbon
Fish Wave Feminism
Fishery Feud Alters EU Plans
Sardines Feed Farmed Salmon

Transcript preview

First 90 seconds

  1. Justine Paradis· Host0:01

    Hey, Nate. Hey, Kate.

  2. Nate Heggie· Host0:02

    Hey.

  3. Kate Dario· Host0:02

    Hey, Justine.

  4. Justine Paradis· Host0:02

    So at a recent Outside In meeting, we were discussing our plans for this episode, and Kate, you actually told us about something that happened to you recently. Do you mind telling us that story?

  5. Kate Dario· Host0:14

    So I was having a birthday dinner with some of my friends. They were giving me very s- sweet and thoughtful gifts, and one of my closest friends, she showed up with a bunch of individually wrapped little boxes.

  6. Justine Paradis· Host0:27

    Ooh.

  7. Kate Dario· Host0:27

    And I had a suspicion what they were because we have a shared interest, and they were exactly what I thought they were, which was a beautiful display of tinned fishes. [upbeat music] It was an amazing birthday gift, and we had basically, like, the fish equivalent of a charcuterie board afterwards, and it was super, super yummy.

  8. Nate Heggie· Host0:50

    I have been completely in the dark with this term tinned fish. [laughs] It sounds so much nicer than I think what I normally think of as just, like, cheap sardines.

  9. Kate Dario· Host1:02

    Totally. I think that tinned fish, which I guess is, like, the classy way to say fish in a can- [laughs] ... has somehow undergone some type of rebranding that it felt equivalent to, like, if my friend had given me really nice, like, gourmet chocolate or flowers or a bottle of wine. Like, it's like a delicacy.

  10. Nate Heggie· Host1:20

    So this is not like your Chicken of the Sea, Bumble Bee style cans.

  11. Kate Dario· Host1:25

    Oh, totally. I think... I mean, I think part of the appeal is it's like

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