With the summer over (sad face) but the warm days of Indian Summer lingering on (happy face), this dish will be relavant for a few more weeks (for those who are super traditional about eating warm weather dishes only in warm weather). For me, this will be an excellent dish to eat after months of freezing winter weather and extra fat stored from weeks of heavy stews. It’s a mix of light and heavy, but, for some reason, it feels lighter than heavier. Maybe that’s just what I’m telling myself?

Roughly translating to tuna’d tuna, tonno tonnato is grilled tuna with a cold tuna sauce, and probably doesn’t sound all that appealing. Even the photographs can not capture how delicious this dish really is (beige on beige – gorgeous!). That could be because it’s fish, but, if you think about the concept behind it, i.e. making a sauce out of the same thing as the principal element of the dish, you are reminded just how many times you’ve had a meat sauce. Taking it to it’s logical conclusion, how many times have you had leftover bolognese sauce cold the day after? It’s pretty good, right? In fact, most long-cooked sauces taste even better the day after.

Tonno Tonnato is take on the traditional Piedmontese dish, Vitello Tonnato, a cold, sliced veal dish topped with the cold tuna sauce (one we will make someday for this here blog). Vitello Tonnato is sure to make many American’s scratch their head in wonderment (or maybe even make their stomach churn at the mere idea of the dish). We are one food culture that doesn’t often mix fish with meat like many other countries do (with the exception of some Creole/Cajun and Lowcountry dishes). But, if you’ve ever given it a try, you’d realize just how well they can go together.

I think the tonnato sauce alone could be used in a variety of ways if you don’t feel like topping some tuna with it. It would make a great spread on some grilled bread with a bit of white beans and herbs mixed together as a bruchetta topping. Throw it in a bowl with some veggies as a dip? Toss it with some cold macaroni for a twist on tuna pasta salad? How about as a nice little condiment for your pannini (depending on the stuffing, of course) or maybe as a dipping sauce for some crispy fried shrimp, fried zucchini or fried oysters (or anything fried for that matter)?

It is important you try to have an open mind about tonnato. So, if you think of the tonnato (the sauce portion of the dish) as a fish version of a cold meat sauce, it might sound more appetizing. On the other hand, it might not. So feel free to skip this one if it grosses you out, but do us a favor and first ask yourself if you would turn your nose up at a nice medium-rare steak topped with bolognese sauce.

**A little on a personal note:  You may notice we’ve been kind of MIA for the past 4 or 5 months – we really haven’t been posting as much. Well, we have a little bambino coming our way within the month and, although we love this blog, we also love life and, as you know, sometimes blogging can feel like it’s getting in the way of living life.  Although we have still been cooking, we’ve also been trying to prepare for the kid, moved, Jonny started a new, more stressful job, we set up a nursery, learned about breast pumps, binky’s, boppy’s, barfy’s and any other stupid thing babies r us tries to make you think you need (I swear all I had growing up was a cardboard box for a toy and an umbrella stroller!).  Jonny and I have also been enjoying our time together before this child arrives and turns our relaxing twosome into, well, who knows, probably a crazy, loud, but fun 3-some (ok that sounds weird).  So you can see why blogging took a back seat to more important things.  We are excited but, naturally, nervous.  We swear we will still be cooking up a storm as soon as we learn how to parent a newborn so, please stick with us. We may be silent for a few months, but we won’t be gone.  And I promise I will not turn this blog into a way to showcase my kid and his latest round of “perfect poos or perfect coos” and I promise we will not feature recipes for homemade baby food!  This blog will remain Jonny and my baby – our thing.  We’ve still gotta have our little things that are just for us, right? That’s not being too selfish? So, again, we don’t often get too personal around We Are Never Full, but we felt like all 4 of you who actually read our blog deserved to know why we haven’t really been keeping up the way we used to recently.  Hopefully this new little life will inspire amazing dishes in the near future!  Stay tuned!

The heavens have cleared here in NYC, finally.  After over twenty straight days of clouds and/or rain, we celebrated the welcoming warm and sunny weather with something light and bright.  Before this week, bathing suit season seemed very, very far away – then the heat and sun came and getting into a bathing suit began staring me in the face immediately. Barf.  I’ll need a few less choripáns and patacones and a few more lentils and fish to feel a bit less “Dance Your Ass Off contestant” and a bit more Gisele Bündchen pre-pregnancy (that ain’t no beer bloat, please).

With the abundance of basil out in the garden, we decorated our plate of lentils and quickly seared, sesame-crusted tuna steaks with some fresh, bright basil oil.  Easiest thing to make and extremely delicious.  Nothing much more to elaborate on except to say that this meal cost about $5 each and took about twenty minutes to prepare.  Can’t get any better than that (well except if I really did look like Gisele).

If you’re like me, you love to eat… and drink… and eat and drink. This is what the weekends are for! We often are more gluttonous on a Friday and Saturday night that by Sunday we’re rubbing our bloated bellies with the Sunday blues and the need to detox. Many Monday dinners are “light” (well, light for us) which usually means fish, salad or even (DARE WE SAY!) a vegetarian meal (ok, remove the egg to make it veggie). By Tuesday we’re starting to feel kind of healthy again. Here is a meal you’ve seen on many menus, many, many times. Not extremely creative, but it’s pretty easy to make and tastes filling and satisfying when you feel like having a healthy meal. Here’s our version of the infamous “Salad Nicoise”. Traditionally, anchovies are used but we left them out. Add ‘em if ya want. We also used capers instead of the traditional black olives (although often the salad has both) and left out the traditional green pepper (I’m not a fan of raw green pepper so I left that out).

SALAD NICOISE the SEPPY-SILLS WAY:

Ingredients:

• 1 or 2 tuna steaks (depending on how hungry you are), I like sushi-grade
• 1 bag of leafy greens/spring mix/whatever greens you like
• 2 ripe tomatoes
• 2 Hard-Boiled egg (the perfect hard-boiled egg: boil egg for 7-8 minutes… no more! stop the cooking by immersing egg in an icy bath of cold H2O)
• handful of capers
• handfull of fresh chives
• 1 sliced spring onion
• handfull of green beans
• 10 stalks of asparagus
• dijon mustard
• champagne vinegar (or white wine vinegar or, hell, red wine vinegar)
• olive oil

What to do:

1. Boil some H2O and hard-boil your eggs (see above for the ‘recipe’). When they are done, fish them out w/ a slotted spoon and save that boiled water.
2. Boil the green beans and asparagus for 3-4 minutes (or until they are still crispy enough to your liking – you do NOT want them to be limp and over-cooked). Shock them in an icy bath water (can you re-use the same water the eggs were in?) to stop them from cooking. Fish out of the icy-water when cooled and put aside.
3. Heat up a grill pan so it’s nice and hot. If using a cast-iron grill, make sure it’s heated up a bit earlier so it’s nice and hot in order to sear the tuna quickly.
4. Cut up your tomatoes however you like (I use plum tomatoes an cut them in half and then in quarters).
5. Slice up your spring onion (into thin slices).
6. Prep you tuna steaks very simply – rub some olive oil on both sides and sprinkly with salt and pepper. You can “jazz it up” (jazz hands!) with some other herbs or spices – experiment! But I think it’s best when it’s nice and simple.
7. Put your tuna steaks on the grill pan to sear quickly. Time it – no more than 1 1/2 to 2 minutes per side (depending on thickness). You want it nice a pink on the inside and seared on the outside. Take off grill to rest for a few minutes.
8. Now make your vinagrette by combining in a bowl:
   • 1 teaspoon Dijon Mustard
   • 1 tablespoon vinegar
   • pinch of salt and pepper
   • MIX UP with a whisk
   • Slowly add some extra virgin olive oil while whisking the ingredients in the bowl
   • DONE! Taste to make sure you feel there’s enough mustard taste and vinegar taste for your liking.
9. Add your vinagrette to your spring/lettuce mix but reserve a couple of teaspoons. Toss.
10. Slice your tuna steaks against the grain (so it stays together in pieces) and slice up your cooled asparagus into 2 inch slices. Cut the ends of your green beans off – do it on an angle to look fancy). Run your knife through your capers to give it a rough chop. Rough chop your chives.
11. Assemble your plate! Put your mixed lettuce on the plate and assemble the veggies on and around it. Place a few slices of the tuna on top. Spoon a bit extra vinagrette on top of the tuna.

ENJOY!

This brings me to the point of this post – when traveling in Northern Italy last month I had many “D.A.H.M’s” but the one that stands out the most is a dish that Jonny had at a small, random little restaurant in a small town on the island of Elba off the coast of Tuscany. The dish was Pasta con Tonno. Pasta with Tuna… huh? Yes, many of you may be thinking…. naaaasty. Eww. Why would you put something you mix with mayo on top of warm pasta. Forget it. Well, don’t. It’s awesome. The key is to buy actual TONNO -not “Chicken of the Sea” or any other American-style Tuna Fish in a can. You must buy Italian Tonno in Olio/Olive Oil (usually about $2.99 a can but WELL worth it). Bumble Bee brand makes an OK one… but not as good as the European kind. Whatever, all the Yellowtail in Oil tastes good in this dish.

While waiting for my husband to come home after a night of hanging out at the pub, I was starving and couldn’t wait any more. I threw this dish together at 9.30PM in 12 minutes w/o having to go to the store. You may also substitute the radicchio in this recipe for swiss chard, as we recently tried. Delish!

Here’s my attempt to help you recreate it:

PASTA CON TONNO (Serves 2-4)

Ingredients:

• 1 or 2 cans Tonno in Olive Oil (if you can’t find, you could try it w/ a can of tuna packed in oil – not water!)
• 3-4 tablespoons of Extra Virgin Olive Oil (use Extra Virgin – it’s the sauce… don’t skimp on taste for calories, please…)
• 1 big clove of garlic – sliced or chopped
• 1 small onion – chopped
• 1 handful of cherry tomatoes – sliced in half
• juice of 1 lemon
• optional (just tried this last night and it added a nice extra layer of flavor) – thinly sliced red radicchio
• Salt and Pepper
• Sprinkling of Parmigiano Reggiano
• 1 Box of your fave short pasta – I like Fusilli, Gemelli or Penne

How to Do It:

1. Start boiling the water for your pasta – don’t forget to heavily salt and throw a tablespoon of olive oil in there!
2. Add about 3 tablespoons or so (eyeball enough olive oil so that it covers the bottom of the pan)
3. On Low-Medium (closer to Medium) heat, add the chopped onion. After about 2-3 minutes, when onion is partially cooked, turn heat down to low and throw in the garlic.
4. Throw your pasta into the water – make sure you know how many minutes till it’s al dente! I usually subtract at least 2 minutes from the package’s cooking time to make sure I get it right.
5. Let the garlic flavor get absorbed by the olive oil. When you slowly and lowly heat the oil, the garlic will almost create a garlic oil. This will give your “sauce” more flav-a.
6. About 3 minutes before your pasta will be done, throw in the tomatoes… add a bit of Salt and Pepper. Feel free to stir the stuff around a bit. Keep that heat on low!
7. Check the pasta for al dente. Drain the pasta but reserve 1 Tablespoon of the pasta water for the sauce.
8. Throw the pasta into the pan w/ the oil, onions, garlic and tomatoes and add the tablespoon of reserved pasta water.
9. Add the whole can of tonno with it’s oil.
10. Squeeze some lemon all over. Stir. Add a bit of S&P to taste. Throw your thinly sliced, optional radicchio in there. Sprinkle some Parmigiano over it. Stir again and VOILA! Serve w/ some fresh basil if you want.

This meal takes however long it takes for pasta to boil to be completed. Give it a whirl and let me know what you think.