Monday, October 23, 2006

Tuna salad

This one's adapted from Michael Smith's book Chef at Home. I like this tuna salad a lot and use it every week or so to make sandwiches for my and kids lunches. It's also great just eating on it's own as a side or a snack. It's also one that really encourages experimentation with incredients and ratios until you find that way you like the best. This makes 4 to 6 good-sized sandwiches.
2 cans tuna
1 tbsp diced red onion
1 1/2 diced dill pickles
small handful chopped cilantro
1 1/2 stalks celery
2 tbsp dijon mustard
splash of olive oil so it all holds together
salt & pepper to taste

1. combine all the ingredients in a bowl & prepare sandwiches.

Another thing I like about this recipe is that it's a nice sandwich salad that doesn't use mayo. A very important consideration is what kind of tuna you use. The Italian style tuna packed in olive oil, but that's a bit expensive sometimes. Using one can of Italian (use the oil) and one of regular tuna packed in water (drain the water) works very well too.

1 comment:

Diane said...

I made a variation of this recipe tonight, using: one can of water-packed tuna; 1/4 of a medium-sized white onion, diced; one small dill pickle, diced; a tablespoon or so (maybe a little more) of stone ground mustard; a little olive oil; and the salt and pepper to taste. I served it open-faced style on a couple of slices of multigrain bread I had on hand and because I didn't have any potato chips available I just served some flamin' hot Cheetos on the side.

Now, I was a tiny bit hesitant to try this tuna salad out because I was raised on the traditional tuna salad, with mayo, celery, and diced olives. But when I gave it a taste after putting in a tiny pinch of salt and some pepper, I thought it tasted delicious, and it tasted even better on top of the bread and accompanied by the Cheetos. Best of all, I ate my fill of tuna salad and had a little left for a snack for another day!

I think I'm going to have to try this with oil-packed tuna, which I've always avoided purchasing since it tastes nasty and slimy with my traditional tuna salad preparation. I think it'd lend itself well to Michael Smith's tuna salad recipe. Also, I'll have to try to remember to add cilantro in the salad next time. I'd totally forgotten about that. And while I wouldn't go for dijon mustard, I'm a big fan of spicy brown mustard so I think that might be good to try out in the recipe.

Thanks for posting the recipe! It's much closer to what Michael Smith showed on the "Chef at Home" program than the recipe posted on the Food Network Canada website. The only thing it's missing is the potato chips he smashed inside the sandwich.