THERE'S SOMETHING FISHY HERE.. TOO MUCH OIL? (John West Tuna Chunks in Sunflower Oil)

Member Name: Wee_Jackie_163

Product:	John West Tuna Chunks in Sunflower Oil
Date:	29/04/09 (158 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: GOOD VALUE

Disadvantages: TOO MUCH OIL FOR MY LIKING

We eat quite a lot of tinned tuna in our house as my other half absolutely loves tuna mayonnaise and the like; he often takes it to his work with him for his lunch. Because we go through so much of it, I tend to try and buy it in bulk, as it usually works out to be a lot cheaper than buying individual cans as and when we need them.

I was pleased, therefore, when my partner came home with four tins of "John West tuna in Sunflower oil" and happily informed me that all four tins had cost the purse-friendly sum of £1.19 from a local grocer.

I will point out at this stage that I have never before purchased tuna in sunflower oil, and tend to buy canned tuna that is in brine. Not for any reason other than it is what I have always bought. That said, I was happy with the cost of the four cans and put them away until they were needed.

And that day came last weekend! My other half and I were having a small family gathering and were making a selection of food to be served in a buffet style. One of the dishes I wanted to make was some cooked pasta mixed in with a little tuna and served cold as a nice accompaniment to some of the salads we were serving.

I set about making the pasta and let it cool. Then I retrieved one of the cans of John West tuna in sunflower oil from the plastic outer wrapping that was keeping all four cans in place. I noted that the tin needed to be opened with a tin-opener as there was no ring-pull on the top of the tin (although this is normal practice for tinned tuna in general, in my experience).

Upon opening the tin I was instantly aware of the oil escaping from the top where the tin-opener had made a slit in the can, as it was running all over my fingers! Rinsing it off, I finished opening the tin and drained the oil from the tuna.

I was aware that the amount of oil seemed to be a much higher quantity than the brine that usually surrounds my tinned tuna. Once drained, the tuna fish looked really greasy and I found this a bit off-putting if I'm honest.

I was a bit concerned about using the tuna in my dish at all... I certainly didn't want a greasy cold pasta dish to be served to my guests when they arrived. As I didn't have an alternative in my larder, I had no choice but to carry on with the oily tuna, but I was very wary of it by this point. It just appeared to be absolutely swimming in oil, even though I had drained it twice.

I needn't have worried as I was left with nice dry-looking tuna flakes once I combined it to the pasta I had previously cooked. There didn't appear to be any oily residue at all, much to my relief! I added the other couple of ingredients to the bowl and once I mixed it through, I set it to the side of the other salad dishes already positioned in the midst of the buffet. I was happy to note that it looked like it usually did.

On tasting the tuna pasta salad, several of our guests commented on how delicious it was. It is not usually a dish I would eat myself, although I make it quite often for my partner. He also commented to me that it was "awesome", which is higher praise than I usually get.

Curious to see if I could taste the difference in the tuna because of the sunflower oil, I spooned a small amount of the tuna pasta dish onto my paper plate. Like I said earlier, I wouldn't normally eat this dish (I'm not the world's biggest tuna fan) but curiosity got the better of me.

I had to agree with my guests and say that it was absolutely delicious! I asked my mother if she thought it was the tuna and she thought it was more likely to be the onion that I had finely diced and stirred through the dish, as there was a slightly sweet aftertaste to the dish, and she didn't think this would be coming from the tuna.

I'm not saying for a fact that it WAS the different tuna; perhaps it was the onion, as my mother suggested, but all I know is that out of the whole spread of food that we put out, the bowl of tuna pasta salad was the only dish to be left completely empty, so something worked!! That in itself is all the proof that I need!

I am going to award this tuna four stars. I am deducting one because of the amount of oil... I just found this to be so off-putting.

Summary: Not sure if i'd buy it again