Mega tuna. At «The Chedi», things are gene­ral­ly a litt­le big­ger. That is also true of the tuna on this day. Chef Dietmar Sawyere recei­ves a spe­cial deli­very: a 105 kg bluef­in tuna from Spain. Delicatessen sup­plier Bianchi deli­ver­ed ear­ly in the mor­ning. The Styrofoam box with the fish insi­de is about the size of a chest free­zer. «Woaah», exclaims Kazuki Taniguchi, Sawyere’s sushi master at «The Japanese Restaurant». The Japanese chef has never bro­ken down such a lar­ge fish. But befo­re fil­le­ting can begin, the ice has to be skim­med off to bring the tuna to the Japanese restaurant.

Curious looks. The chil­led – not fro­zen – fish is whee­led through the «cat­a­combs» of the «Chedi» on a ser­vice trol­ley. And how do you get this huge thing onto the coun­ter? «The two of us can mana­ge it», says Sawyere with a healt­hy dose of opti­mism. But he is mista­ken: two more crew mem­bers have to lend a hand. Time and again, a curious face pokes its nose into the restau­rant. Because what is hap­pe­ning here does not hap­pen every day. «Normally we order tuna weig­hing 40 kg», says Sawyere.

Backbreaking work. Dietmar Sawyere, Kazuki Taniguchi and sous-chef Radu Spinei set about taking the huge thing apart. Backbreaking work. Filleting is not neces­s­a­ri­ly more dif­fi­cult, but cer­tain­ly more stre­nuous. Sawyere and his team will not need to go to the gym today. First they saw off the fins, then they get down to busi­ness. With the mea­ty parts, a distinc­tion is made bet­ween toro and aka­mi. Toro refers to the bel­ly cuts: chut­oro, oto­ro, kama toro. They are very fat­ty and much ligh­ter than aka­mi, the cuts from the back. And a direct taste com­pa­ri­son shows: toro is far more inten­se in fla­vour, an uma­mi bomb.

«Nose to tail». All pie­ces can be used for both sushi and hot tuna dis­hes. Nothing is wasted. In Switzerland, ever­ything ser­ved raw must be deep-fro­zen for 24 hours. «The meat goes into the blast free­zer, so the qua­li­ty does not suf­fer eit­her», says Sawyere. This means the giant tuna is used up in about two weeks. But the work is not yet done. The crew scra­pes all the meat off the bones. «We use the trim­mings, for exam­p­le, for tuna tar­ta­re», says Sawyere. The finis­hed pie­ces are then divi­ded up: one part stays in the «Chedi» main buil­ding, ano­ther part goes to the «branch» on the «Gütsch». After around an hour, the har­dest part is done. Chef Dietmar can pla­te up – for the pho­to. He arran­ges a pie­ce of aka­mi and a pie­ce of toro on the pla­te. Avocado, gin­ger and cavi­ar are ser­ved along­side. The who­le thing sits under a clo­che fil­led with cher­ry­wood smoke.