Canned tuna can swim alongside so much more than mayo. Salty from the sea but not too fishy, it brings a lot to meals, with its juiciness and substantial yet delicate flakiness. It’s also pantry-friendly, budget-friendly and good for you. Here’s how to zhuzh up a can of tuna for a school of quick, flavor-forward dishes.
1. Add tang with tomatoes.
Tuna is rich, oily and salty. Tomatoes are anything but, which means that their sweet-and-sour juices can energize a can of tuna in raw or cooked form. Chop a plump one for tuna salad, or cook some down for a sauce.
2. Crumble potato chips on top.
Potato chips are fun to eat, of course, and they play a pivotal role when paired with tuna, whose tenderness needs something to keep it from being too sleepy. Enter chips, which take tuna sandwiches, casseroles and more from retro to timeless with their crisp texture.
3. Double up on brine.
If tuna were a pop star, briny ingredients like capers, olives, pickles and kimchi would be its backing vocalists, lifting up its briny qualities. Together, they reach high notes of tang and salt. So if your tuna dish seems quiet and drab, look to the condiments in your fridge door to help it stand out.
4. Scatter with raw sliced onion.
The tiny bits of raw onion bring excitement to tuna salad, bursting with juicy crunch and spicy kick in an otherwise creamy salad. But more is more: By cutting the onion in long, slender slices, you’ll get bigger wallops.
5. Add creaminess with white beans.
White beans can support the more assertive ingredients in a dish. They add creamy bites to salads, or they can be literal support, mashed into patties for frying and casseroles.
6. Dot with toasted sesame oil.
Toasted sesame oil is made by extracting the oils from slowly roasted sesame seeds. Even in minuscule doses, it adds a nutty, silky savoriness to whatever it touches. In the presence of sesame oil, tuna tastes fuller and richer.
7. Shingle cucumbers for juiciness.
Can you really enjoy a tuna sandwich without a pickle spear alongside? The pickle jolts with brine and salt, but it’s also, at its heart, a cucumber, which is juicy, crisp and sweet — all things tuna is not. That’s why the two work well together (opposites attract and all that).
