Original Italian name: Tonno Alla Palermitana
Place of origin: Sicily, Southern Italy

In Sicily, Southern part of Italy, The Mattanza is the traditional method of tuna fishing.  This event provides an occasion for the whole village to celebrate a folklore festival. This major tradition gets underway with an morning mass to bless the fishing boats before they sail out with nets. Singing old folk songs as they work, the fishermen start setting up the various corrals of netting in which the tuna will be trapped.

These corrals are anchored by heavy stones to the sea bed. Now, all they have to do is wait. Later the most experienced fisherman has the honour of signaling the actual start of the Mattanza. When the first shoals are sighted , the fishermen sail out early in the morning to start reducing the size of the corrals in which the tuna are now confined. To this day, food festivals are still celebrated in early summer in honour of this fish.

Tuna is a big fish of the sea and can grow up to 14 feet that is around 4 m long and weight several tonnes. Tuna fish can be cooked fresh or else the raw fish fillet can be eaten as carpaccio cut into small slices and sprinkle with a lemon marinade. Old traditional method is  preserved tuna fish in salt, mature for a month and then it can be used as an ingredient in certain salads. However, the most popular method is preserved tuna fish in oil and later used as ingredients for various salads.

For today dinner my choice was broiled tuna fish covered by sardines fillet to serving. This method of cooking tuna fish named in Italy Palermo style tuna fish.

Ingredients:

2 fresh tuna fillets r(around 150g each) or 300-400 g tuna fish
1/2 glass of dry white wine
juice of 1/2 lemon
1 spring of rosemary
1 garlic clove, crushed
2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 sardine fillets
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method:

To make a  marinade, combine the wine, lemon juice with the rosemary, garlic, a little salt and pepper. Slice the tuna fish into steaks, wash thoroughly, then leave into marinade mixer for several hours.

Remove the fish from the marinade, drain off excess liguid and broil on both sides, basting with the marinade from time to time.

Meanwhile, heat the oil in the skillet, add the sardines and mash into the paste. Spread this over the tuna fish and serve.