Tuna steak GGC

I love tuna.

I like the red meat, the tough structure, the salty taste, the low-fat and calories.

I eat it cooked, raw and tinned.

However, tuna fish is suffering from my, and a billion other consumers’, appetite and the species is endangered.

That is why I do not often eat tuna. I try to buy fish that has been caught in the Atlantic ocean and not further away or in the enclosed Mediterranean and, in general, I do not buy the most-endangered blue-fin tuna. That is mainly because I do not find it on my market stalls and because I do not pay 50 euro per pound of fish, but also out of some conservation considerations. A little voice in my mind tells me that I would like to taste a morsel of blue-fin tuna once, just like whale which I should hot even want to discover……

The tuna in the tins I buy at French supermarkets contain fish from all over the world’s seas and I have no idea about how they were caught and, small print on the tins aside, I do not know what kind of fish is inside the tin. I do know that the mention “produced in Brittany” that I found on one flag-waving supermarket tin is, of course, nonsense. “Canned in Côtes d’Armor”, “Tinned in Tréguier”, “Packed in Plouharnel”, would have been more accurate. But the French are willing to pay more for these tins of tuna than for the cheaper brands from Africa or Asia (and there may be no objective reason for that).

It is a dilemma, how to eat in a healthy way without endangering the species. Fish is better than meat, man is not a vegetarian creature by birth, we eat (recently) living things as long as our conscience does not make us do otherwise.
So the other day I spotted some tuna steaks that were smiling at me on a market stall; reddish and not grey, slightly shiny and not dry.
Tuna meat itself has a bland taste, be it far from unpleasant. It has a ‘meaty’ taste which may explain its popularity among carnivores.
Raw, I always have some wasabi or horse radish on the side. Cooked, I often add some spice.
As in this ‘tuna steak GGC’, (Garlic, Ginger and Chilli, the awesome threesome).

Here I used olive oil but if you want to underline the Asian taste combination you can use sunflower or peanut oil, and add chopped cilantro.

Ingredients (for two)

• Two chunks of tuna fillet of 100-150 grammes each
• A five-cm piece of ginger root
• Three cloves of garlic
• Some chilli oil
• Olive oil
• White pepper

Steps

1. Pat the tuna dry.
2. Peel the ginger root, cut up in small sticks.
3. Peel the garlic, slice up finely.
4. Heat the oil in a skillet.
5. When oil is hot (it starts to smoke) put in the tuna steaks and cook for 2 minutes on each side. Test for colour and prolong cooking time a bit if he fish remains red inside. Put aside.
6. Add the garlic and ginger to the skillet, add some oil if needed.
7. Fry and toss for a minute and then add a tablespoon of chilli oil.
8. Put the tuna on a serving plate, add pepper from the mill and put the garlic and ginger mix on the fish, adding some of the chilli oil.