Joie Warner's Take a Tin of Tuna

by Joie Warner and Drew Warner

With best-selling cookbook author Joie Warner in charge, everybody's favorite staple is the stuff great meals are made of. Emphasizing variety and simplicity, Warner offers 65 adventurous ways to transform this pantry stand-by into a delicious dish, including recipes for starters, soups, sandwiches, salads, and entrees. With over a dozen tantalizing tuna sandwich fillings to choose from, featuring ingredients like sun-dried tomatoes, pesto, and even...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0811835421
• ISBN13: 9780811835428
• Release Date: June 2004
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (CA)
• Length: 124 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 8.7" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

AMAZING TUNA RECIPES GOOD ENOUGH FOR COMPANY!

I've been collecting Joie's cookbooks for several years now. I have more than 200 cookbooks in my library, but hers are among my absolute favorites. I cook from her pizza, chicken and muffin books all the time. And I think her `no-cook pasta sauces' cookbook is brilliant. I recently bought Joie's Take a Tin of Tuna and like her other cookbooks, her recipes are simple to prepare, always turn out perfectly and taste wonderful. The book has lots of pretty pictures of yummy-looking soups, sandwiches, appetizers, and main dishes. I never knew there were so many ways to prepare tuna and how sophisticated this food item could be. Now I'm cooking from her new tuna book and so far these are my favs, 1) tuna and sweet corn chowder--my husband and kids loved it! 2) tuna tapanade--friends dropped by and I made this instant tuna spread with ingredients I had in my cupboard. 3) tuna, lemon and caper crostini-- elegant and easy with great "wow" factor. 4) deep-fried tuna wontons--sounded weird, tried it, tasted fab. 5) tuna and bacon stuffed baked potatoes-- pure comfort food. 6) curried tuna and chutney salad with mango--awsome tuna salad. 7) tuna reuben sandwich--I think I like it better than the original with corned beef! 8) grilled eggplant, tuna and roasted red pepper panini--totally awesome sandwich. 9) classy tuna noodle casserole--simply fab. I served it to guests and they all wanted the recipe. 10) extra lemony tuna risotto--so good and easy I've made it 6 times already. I can't wait to try the broccoli, cheddar and tuna chowder and the tuna stuffed red peppers. My only tiny complaint is that in some of her recipes using olive oil, she discards the oil in the can instead of using it as part of the ingredients. I am quite a frugal person and I've recently discovered that I actually like the tuna flavored oil. So why not use it? I did not understand Mr. Marold's tirade about dried parsley and basil. What I really love about this author's recipes is her bounteous use of fresh basil, parsley and chives. I've read the book cover to cover and there isn't one recipe with dried parsley. And only one recipe--her tuna creole--uses dried basil, which FYI is traditional in Cajun and Creole food. (I know, cause I lived in Louisiana for ten years).Cajuns use lots of dried spices and herbs including dried basil--even garlic powder, as does my favorite Cajun cookbook by Chef Paul Prudhomme. I give this book five stars. The first for offering truly inspired recipes for such a common ingredient. The second for originality (not the same old run-of-the-mill recipes) and practicality (these recipes I'll actually use).The third is for providing amazing canned tuna recipes that are actually good enough to serve to company. The fourth is for her helpful tuna tips and list of pantry items. I took the author's advice and now use tuna in olive oil, not the bland stuff in water I've been eating since childhood. The fifth star is for explaining that in pl

Excellent Recipes for Star Pantry Item. Highly Recommended

Jolie Warner has produced another of her 20 cookbooks, `take a tin of tuna', in that relatively undistinguished but very worthy genre of recipe collections centered around a single ingredient, in this case, canned tuna. While Ms. Warner does not have the high wattage name like Cat Cora, Tony Bourdain, or Rachael Ray, she is doing us a service as good or better than these very readable chef / authors. That is, she is giving us 65 recipes for an extremely inexpensive, durable staple. With this book and similar books on recipes for pasta, potatoes, sardines, corn meal, and canned tomatoes, one can live like a king with good recipes on a pauper's income. Ms. Warner has put one more nail in the coffin of my projected book on cooking cheaply but well. Before I go any further, I must put in a plug for canned tuna. Like several other ingredients that have been available in a can for a very long time, this product has virtually taken on a life of its own, completely distinct from the cuisine and recipes based on fresh tuna. Like salt cod, it is not only accepted as a different product, it is actually better for many recipes than the fresh flesh, which is both highly perishable and requires a fair amount of subtlety to cook well. Even the highest authorities on French cooking give us Salad Nicoise made with canned tuna. The first chapter in this book is the routine intro. on showing us around the varieties of canned tuna and itemizing good pantry items to have on hand to work with tuna. While this list, especially the first half, is better than most, it violates my standing rule about pantry lists in that it lists several relatively perishable items in the refrigerator and dried basil in the spice rack. I use lots of dried spices, but I would not use dried basil or parsley short of having a gun put to my head. Both are available fresh the year around and fresh parsley is usually dirt-cheap. I do respect the author's recommending selected national brands for bacon and mustard. I have seen good things said about her recommended products, but I have seen bad things said about them as well. Be very aware that in spite of the sense that it is virtually imperishable, please know that mustard looses its pizzazz after about three months in the bottle, so don't stockpile the stuff, especially the stuff shipped to us from France. Among the recipes, you will find all the old standards such as Salade Nicoise, Tuna salad, and Tuna casserole, but you will find lots of other goodies as well. The first chapter of recipes is on starters with recipes for stuff such as tuna tapenade, tuna dips, tuna and caper spread, tuna wontons, and tuna tapas, for example. I think I will pass on the tuna fondue. The second chapter of recipes gives us tuna coups and chowders where, among other things, we have tuna standing in for clams and keeping company with beans, corn, broccoli and cheddar, and tomatoes. I get strongly positive feelings about all these recipes. This may be worth th