New and Improved! Tuna confit

Way back when, Annalena posted a recipe for slow cooked tuna: tuna confit. She said that it was one of her favorite recipes, and indeed it was, and is. If you read it, you will remember the laments about the amount of oil it used, which could not be reused, and if you MADE it (as Professor Bob and his lovely wife did), you probably then had to make a judgement call on whether or not to make it again, given how long it took.

Now, Annalena is not afraid of spending time in the kitchen, but as with all of us, if there is a quicker way to get to the same result: she's there. So when one of her favorite chefs, David Tanis, posted a recipe for "slow cooked albacore" she had to give it a second look. And a third. Then she made it. Boys and girls, strike the old, bring in the new, this one is terrific, as Annalena would expect, coming from the pen of Chef David.

My version is (surprise, surprise, surprise), just a bit different from his. And there are options that you can use, and I will present them, and also a bit of advise as to a possible issue that is not in his recipe. Anyway, here we go.

You can find the original at www.nytimes.com. For now, though, you start with one pound of tuna. Get the best you can, BUT DO NOT GET BLUEFIN TUNA. IF YOU DO I WILL PUT A CURSE ON YOU. Bluefin are the monsters of the sea and, if you have been living under a rock for a while, know they are being fished to extinction. Other varieites of tuna are available, they are delicious, and they are not nearly as endangered. And, having said that, if you are going to buy bluefin tuna to make tuna confit, well... I want to meet your trust fund. So, yellowfin, albacore, anything you can find. If you are buying local, it won't be an issue. I don't think any of the local fishermen are equipped to bring in the monsters, so you're going to be ok, but ASK.

Preheat your oven to 350, while you prep things. Chef Tanis suggests cutting the tuna into one inch slices. In Annalena's view, if you are going to cut that big, you may as well leave it in one piece. I went to slices that were about 1/2-1/3 inch wide. You may very well think you are slicing a steak which, in fact, you are.

Put those into a small baking dish. All of mine were occupied at the moment, so I used a ceramic pie pan. Metal is a taboo here. Salt and pepper the fish, both sides, and then prep your spices.

I followed his recommendation which was to take half a teaspoon each of fennel seeds and red pepper, and grind them in my spice mill (which is an old burr type coffee bean grinder). You should use what sounds good to you, but just a note: Italians have been combining fennel and pepper with tuna for thousands of years. Just sayin...

Ok, sprinkle this over the fish, crush three cloves of garlic and toss them in the dish and also add a sprig of rosemary. No need to de-stem it or anything, you're really just flavoring the oil, and it's not going to be cooking long enough to worry about woody tannin flavors. Now, here's the part that is so cool: only add enough oil to come aout half way up the fish: it won't be more than about half a cup.

Go check the old recipe. See what I mean?

Get this into the oven and bake for ten minutes. Then, protect your hands, take out the dish and turn the fish. Here's where you may have a bit of issue: the fish may stick a bit to the pan, notwithstanding all that oil. Do the best you can, and don't worry, because ultimately you'll crumble this stuff.

Bake for another ten minutes, and ragazzi, you are done. Just let the stuff cool and then store the fish, until you're ready to use it, but use it within a week.

Now, as another of Annalena's idols (Ina), would say, "how easy is that?" This is going together with some shell beans and Buddha only knows what later this week.

If you're in the kitchen, involved with doing something stovetop, this is something that can keep your oven occupied, and give you dinner for another day during the week.

I rarely say "out with the old, in with the new," but in this case, it is worth it.