Sardee in Saor

(Tasty Sardines)

This is an old Venetian dish prepared with sardee (= sardines), widespread fish in the Mediterranean Sea. Saor (or sapore in Italian) means “taste”. In the past, but today, too, the families used to eat it on board while participating to the Festa del Redentore (the Redeemer Feast), the 3rd Sunday in July.

This celebration originated half a century ago, to thank Christ for the ending of a terrible plague that scourged Venice in the years 1575-1577. It is still performed nowadays with a beautiful great show of fireworks (something like 45 minutes non-stop). People crowd the canals with every type of boat (gondola included) in order to vardar I foghi (= guardare i fuochi = to look at the fireworks).

Sardee in saor is to be prepared beforehand, at least 3 or 4 days before consuming it, and it is served cold. A very famous Venetian playwright, Carlo Goldoni (1707-1793), who also wrote in Venetian dialect, wrote about this dish in his play Le donne de casa soa.

Ingredients (4 people):

• 1 lb sardines
• 1 lb white onions
• 1 tblsp pinenuts
• 1 tblsp grams raisins
• 1/3 cup red vinegar
• salt to taste
• To fry:
• Oil to fry ( peanut oil works best)
• Flour

Method:

Flake off sardines, cut the head , take the entrails out, wash them thoroughly under running water. Then flour them and fry them in oil, few at a time until they are “golden” both sides. Dry them on kitchen paper and leave to cool. Cut onions into fine slices, brown them in part of the same oil you have used to fry sardines, pour vinegar and salt over them and cook until vinegar is completely absorbed. Then add raisins1 and pinenuts (this is a “winter” variation: to give more calories during the cold season, when people needed more substantial food; you can prepare this dish without them).

Take a big bowl and put alternatively: a layer of sardines and a layer of onions. You’ll start with the fish and finish with the onions.

Serve cool after a few days of its preparation.

It has been calculated that a portion of this food supplies about 645 calories, which is not much; it is healthy and digestible (The disadvantage is the “onion breath” that will last a while…). It can also be recommended to those “vegetarian” people that include fish in their diet and that the latest edition of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary calls pescatarians.

Remember to soften up raisins in warm water. After that you’ll have do “dry” them with kitchen paper.