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Thai Tuna Salad
Canned tuna is definitely one of those ingredients that tend to get overlooked.
However, during this pandemic, I feel like tuna is getting a new take on life and is SHINING! A lot of people are trying to figure out how to make tasty and easy recipes with their canned tuna and this Thai tuna salad, one of my oldest yet trustiest recipes, is here to help!
This Thai tuna salad recipe was posted on my blog years ago and its origination was from this cafe near my office. The cafe calls it Thai tuna salad so I didn’t change the name of it.
When my coworker introduced me to it, I was kind of skeptical. I didn’t think it’d be that good. She told me that I “have to try it” and ever since I got it, I realized that it is so.freaking.addicting.
Unfortunately, this cafe closed and now I’m not able to have my Thai tuna salads from there anymore but thank goodness I recreated it and now I can have it whenever I want at home!
I made a huge batch of this and I put it atop crostini but there’s a multitude of ways to serve Thai tuna salad. You can serve this over a bed of lettuce or spinach leaves or you can serve this atop cucumber slices as mini appetizers for a party or even on beds of endive or celery sticks.
Or, you could make a sandwich with it – kind of like a tuna melt. Or you can use butter crackers and kind of eat this like a dip.
I have also eaten this straight like this as a meal. It’s really versatile and it is full of sesame flavor. The cucumbers, peppers, and red onions just play so well with the tuna and sesame oil. It’s a fairly light dish but it’s so filling because of all the protein you get from the tuna. Omega 3’s anyone?
Other canned tuna recipes to try:
Mediterranean tuna white bean salad
Thai Tuna Salad
Ingredients
- 70 grams canned tuna, drained
- 1 medium red bell pepper, diced
- ½ red onion, diced
- 1 cucumber, sliced thinly and diced
- 2 tablespoons sesame oil
- Juice of 1 lime
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- Sesame seeds, as garnish
Instructions
- In a large bowl, break up the tuna into smaller pieces.
- Mix in the red bell pepper, red onion, and cucumber. Pour the sesame oil on top and stir to combine everything. Lastly add the juice of 1 lime and stir again to combine.
- Salt and pepper to taste and garnish with sesame seeds before serving.
Notes
Nutrition
Photography by Ari Laing
Sounds delicious but be careful with this one if you’re watching calories. 3/4 cup of sesame oil is a large quantity – even for 3 cans of tuna . Would be over 360 calories per serving for just the oil (based on 4 servings.
Sorry about the typos. My screen wouldn’t let me see the words as I typed.
I just made this and used less sesame oil by half, but it still tastes too strongly of sesame. Does sesame oil have a short shelf life in the regrigerator. Could that be the problem?
Hi Lisa, sesame oil is really strong so that’s why. If you don’t like it as strong, use a even less next time. It’s a very potent oil :)
Hey Lisa, Thanks for the heads up. I will keep the sesame oil content really low.
Other than that, how was the taste? I know sometimes the picture looks good but the taste isn’t really all that great. I’d appreciate your review.
Thanks!
Inreally like your recipes but being a novice at cooking I sometimes second guess myself and mess up. It would be REAL helpful if you would post pictures of the process of making the dish.
Thanks!
what size tins of tuna do you use?
I think it was a 5-6 ounce can.
Hey, this salad sounds amazing! I was wondering how long you think it would keep for?
I would say at least 3 days!
Thankyou!
Hi , I was browsing your recipes, they look great! Do you have a nutritional value at up for the Thai tuna salad? If you do, would you mind sending to me ? Thx!
Unfortunately, no. There are many reasons as to why I don’t post nutritional information on my recipes, one of which is that I simply do not have the time to do this. Also, I’m not a registered dietician or nutritionist so for me to give any sort of nutritional information would be incorrect and inaccurate. There are also many differing factors when it comes to nutritional information and since I do not have the knowledge in this, I do not feel comfortable posting this sort of information. If you must have this information, there are many calculators out there (free and paid) that can help you with calculations. A simple Google search would pull up some of these calculators, but again, I’m not endorsing them as I do not know how accurate they may be.
So glad I found this! Thank you. =)
This is so yummy! I had to control myself to keep from eating the entire thing! I did make one little adjustment. I only used 1/4 cup of the sesame oil and it was just right for me. It seems like 3/4 cup would be very oily!
Just had this tonight and we loved it! We had Triscuit Original crackers on the side and really enjoyed it