(by Giuseppe Furno, Italian writer and a dear Uncle)

This dish has the colours, the scents and the complex layers of Sicily and the surrounding Mediterranean; intense red Pachino cherry tomatoes, golden onions, dried oregano and sea salt that smells like waves. What else? A 5-6 mm beef steak the size of your hand; bread crumbs, home made if possible and extra virgin olive oil.

For the meat, 2 pieces for each person, maybe more if you like.
Turn on the oven to 170°C, it should not be soaring heat.
Grease a tray with extra virgin olive oil and start:
a) Drag the steaks through the oil on both sides and bread them, then organise neatly in the tray.
b) Cut the cherry tomatoes into slices and cover the meat with them.
c) Sprinkle sea salt over the tomatoes (but not on the meat becuase it will dry it). The salt will help the tomatoes release the juices the meat will need to cook.
d) Chop up the onions and put a layer of them on top of the tomatoes.
e) Dust with oregano to taste.
f) Cook in the oven for about 40 to 50 minutes.Then if you like, once it’s out of the oven you can add a small quantity of capers, I would suggest the ones from Salina, Sicilian capers. Did I forget anything… oh, the name! I like to call it “Carne alla Siciliana”, but it’s simply the way my mother used to cook it. She was Sicilian from Palermo.
To me this dish has her voice, her smile… in summary a memory of her.