Wednesday 4 February 2009

Rare Grilled Tuna & Salsa Verde Salad

We've had a couple days of proper, heavy snow. I've never seen such heavy snow (given that I grew up in a sub tropical country) and these past couple of days have been something else. The picture to the left was taken from my bedroom window this morning.

Still, I craved something light and fresh. I am currently a lady of leisure, as I have two weeks between jobs and the temptation is all to great to just sit around and eat a lot. As I have mentioned before, the guilt does get the better of me. I've made use of this rare time off to properly go to the shops (instead of dashing round in a grump after work, post 7pm) and I came up trumps; a tuna steak! I haven't had one in a long while.

Tuna is quite a meaty fish, and the fresh steaks are a much different beast to the tinned. It's almost sacrilege in my book to cook the steaks anything other than rare, so this is what I did.

Rare Grilled Tuna & Salsa Verde Salad

Serves 1 hungry person

For the Salsa Verde:
Small bunch of parsley, coriander and mint
2 tsp capers, rinsed
1 anchovy, chopped finely
1 small clove of garlic, sliced
1 small green chilli, chopped and deseeded
The juice of half a lime
Extra virgin olive oil

Finely chop the herbs and the capers, and add to a mortar and pestle. Pound lightly until the herbs are well amalgamated, then add the anchovy, garlic, lime and chilli. Pound even more, adding enough extra virgin olive oil to make a smooth sauce.

For the salad:
1 tuna steak, about 200gr
2 handfuls of mixed leaves
2 cooked (not pickled) beetroot, sliced into quarters
A handful of baby tomatoes (Pomodorino are the tastiest I've found)
1/2 a small red onion, sliced thinly
A handful of cooked chickpeas
2 tbsp olives

Easy really - get a griddle pan really smoking hot, oil the tuna steak and slap it on. Depending on how thick it is, cook until rare. I think mine was about a minute on each side, if not less. Rest for 10 minutes, then slice across the grain and season with salt and pepper. Throw all the salad ingredients onto a plate, place the tuna slices on top, and drizzle with the salsa verde. I also drizzled the salad with a bit more olive oil.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous Lizzie! I adore rare tuna and the salsa verde looks so green and fresh. Great addition of chickpeas in the salad too.

Anonymous said...

I can't stand tinned tuna but I love it fresh. This looks lovely, don't think I've had it with salsa verde before.

Joshua said...

Looking good. I could happily eat that now, and I only had lunch ten minutes ago.

Anonymous said...

I long for the day when I am sushi trained (and adequately financed) to not have to cook tuna at all. Beautiful shot of the tuna.

Oliver Thring said...

That looks absolutely delicious. My supper tomorrow night is sorted!

Peter M said...

This seared tuna looks freakin' good...love the grill marks and deep pink inside (phew, it's getting hot).

Anonymous said...

God that looks beautiful! I love nothing more than rare tuna, but due to it's inherent priceyness (technical term) I don't get to eat it often enough!

That looks soo good though!