Tuna With All The Things

For My (It’s Too) Hot Girl Summer

Note: Sunday is a Jewish fast day, Tisha B’Av, so I am posting today instead. Shabbat Shalom.

ABOUT THE TUNA SALAD RECIPE

Here’s a superb tuna salad recipe that’s a hybrid of one from the Sababa cookbook with a few new “toys,” as my husband Jay calls all the add-ins. It’s really important to toast the almonds very deeply, a bit further than you think you might want to, so they’re really golden and crunchy. They add so much to this tuna (add them just before serving), with its funky preserved lemon and sweet dates, buttery Castelvetrano olives, sharp red onion and hot chilies. Always have it in the fridge. It will get eaten, and then you will make more (though this recipe makes a lot, so you can halve it if you are so inclined). And if you have kids, they may even like it, too. I serve mine on good sourdough that I pan-fry in olive oil (because that’s cooking, right? :))

TUNA WITH ALL THE THINGS

Makes 3 - 3 1/2 cups tuna

½ cup whole raw almonds

½ cup mayonnaise

3 tablespoons tahini

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 teaspoon Djion mustard

½ teaspoon kosher salt, plus more for seasoning

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Four 5-ounce cans tuna in water, drained and squeezed of liquid

½ cup finely minced red onion

½ cup chopped pitted castelvetrano olives

½ cup finely chopped parsley

¼ cup (½ small) finely chopped preserved lemon

3 medjool dates, pitted and finely chopped

1 tablespoon minced jalapeño (red or green)

fresh lemon juice for seasoning (optional)

Sliced sourdough bread

Olive oil

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Arrange the almonds on a small rimmed baking sheet; roast until deep golden brown and the skins begin to split, 14 minutes. Remove from the oven, cool completely, and chop.

In a large bowl whisk the mayonnaise, tahini, lemon juice, mustard, salt, and pepper until smooth. Fold in the tuna until incorporated, then fold in the onion, olives, parsley, preserved lemon, dates, and jalapeño. Season with salt, pepper, and lemon juice (if desired). Stir in the almonds just before serving. (PRO MOVE: If you’re fridging this recipe for lunches, leave out the almonds, and top individual portions with the nuts before serving.)

Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Swirl in some olive oil, then add as many slices of bread as you’d like to toast. Toast them, not moving, until the undersides are golden and crisp, 4 to 5 minutes. Season the bread with salt, then pile tuna onto the bread. Enjoy.

THOUGHTS OF A SUMMER-ADDLED BRAIN

I’m officially in my hibernation season, and it probably isn’t the same as yours, which most likely coincides with winter. I have never been a summer baby, and it’s rare to see me out in Tel Aviv’s punishing sun and pea-soup humidity, unless it’s before 8 A.M. or after dark. (I’ve been called a Summer Vampire.) Even though I prefer the confines of my kitchen, with its natural light and industrial-strength A/C, sometimes I have to go out.

Last night was one of those nights, an outing where I was hoping to come to some sort of unspoken agreement with the heat. The only problem is, the heat wasn’t having any of it. At 10 P.M. it was still close to 90 degrees with thick, stifling air that refused to move an inch, even near the typically forgiving sea. I ran back home as quickly as possible and stuck my head in the downstairs freezer for a couple of minutes.

If I could, I might have kept my head in there a lot longer, if only to drown out all the noise. There has been a lot of it, coming from all directions. I won’t show you the things people write to me almost daily. They’re pretty brutal. My skin is thick at this point, but you can imagine. Everyone is frustrated, angry, hurt. Hot in more ways than one.

Things aren’t easy here. (Maybe you’ve read about it???) I’ve been thinking carefully about my words. I know they won’t satisfy anyone, least of all myself. Something always gets left on the floor. This is hard.

We are approaching a fast day, Tisha Be’Av, when we commemorate many tragic events on this day in Jewish history. On a day we refrain from eating, it seems relevant to address the problems with food in Gaza. It’s unavoidable right now, no matter how you feel about it. It touches the nerve of what I do, how I earn my living, and mostly what I share with you. Food.

In a fair world, hungry children would not be part of any war equation. (Nor would emaciated hostages—see below). And yes, there are humanitarian crises around the world that are worse and get a lot less attention—-and that bears examination, too. (Why is no one talking about them? I have my opinions…)

But in my very non-influential view (I am not acting as a journalist here), food flowing into Gaza alleviates the hunger of children and disarms anyone trying to control access of food inside Gaza and use it a cudgel of suffering and manipulation. If there is so much food that it loses any worth beyond its intention (nutrition) and face value, it simply returns to what it is supposed to be: Food. A basic right.

And maybe, just maybe, it will somehow exert pressure on intractable, horrible Hamas to release the hostages and agree to a deal with Israel to cease fire and bring an end to a war that the majority of Israelis (about 80 percent) have said in polls that they want to be done with (for some time).

And. The hostages. There are 50 hostages languishing below ground in Gaza, about 20 of them alive, starved and being tortured in tunnels. Just this week Islamic Jihad released a devastating video of Rom Braslavski, taken hostage at the Nova music festival on October 7, emaciated and clearly psychologically terrorized. Whatever is being done to get Rom and the others out isn’t working. Keep shifting gears. Keep trying. It’s our responsibility to bring them home. It’s only way to heal. They must come home today. Yesterday. 665 days ago.🎗️🎗️🎗️

See you next week. I missed a post this past Sunday, so I will be posting an extra dispatch this Monday for paid subscribers. Lots of love to each and every one of you. I always try to respect your opinions, thank you for listening to mine.