Bonito del Norte

Bonito del Norte is the Spanish name for albacore (Thunnus alalunga), the species behind most of the premium white tuna tinned on this catalogue. Northern Spain and the Basque Country built the tradition around it: pole-and-line or troll-caught in the North Pacific and the Bay of Biscay, then packed by hand in olive oil, prized for the palest, mildest, most texturally refined flesh of any commercially canned tuna. The same fish carries other names elsewhere: White Tuna is the US legal designation, the only species FDA regulations permit to carry that label, Germon in France, tonno bianco in Italy. The fishery received the world's first MSC certification for tuna in 2007. American Tuna, Fishwife, Wild Planet, and Genova represent the US side of the range, from artisan to premium mass-market.

How to eat it: it wants less done to it than everyday tuna. Laid on toast, over a boiled potato with its oil, or flaked into a simple salad, where the quality is the point.