A few years ago, I would have never guessed at my love for tinned tuna. It smelled to me like something a cat would eat. Then one day in Florence, my husband and I ducked into a little shop to grab a bite to eat. We speak no Italian, so I’m not quite sure what I thought the woman offered me, but I nodded. Tonno it was!

She warmed up my sandwich, and we were back out the door, eating as we walked toward the Duomo. “I’m not sure what this is, but it’s good!” A few more bites and I realized it was tuna, with a bit of tomato sauce, a hint of cheese, and some onion. It was like the Tonno Cippolle from La Pizzeria, only on a sandwich bun (and now one of my favorite pizzas). So that’s the story of how I came to love canned tuna, packed in olive oil.

The salad, however, is something I recently tried at Cafe Campbell, and I decided it would make a great lunch to take to work. Creamy cannellini beans mix with the tuna and onion and a sweet balsamic vinaigrette. Sweet, tangy, salty, delicious! (more…)

Filed under:
Dairy free, Gluten free, Italian, Lunch, Salad by Courtney

One of the things on the “must-do” list for our time in Tokyo was visit Tsukiji Market. While I wasn’t so interested in seeing fish auctioned at the crack of dawn, I was certain that if I wanted the freshest of fresh fish, this would be the place to find it. So on the second morning of our trip, my husband and I set off in search of the market.

Luckily, we worked up quite the appetite after getting a little lost coming out of the train station and making a huge loop instead of going direct to the market. By the time we got there, we wondered around, and settled on a sushi bar that had some air conditioning.

Inside, we decided on a sampler of tuna, and our favorite, tako sashimi (octopus), and the requisite Asahi to cool us down. While the fish was amazing, the thing that struck me most was that it was not cold. Unlike in the US, where the fish is cold to nearly freezing, here they served it room temperature, the flavors shining through. I decided to try a bit of uni as well, one of my not-so-favorites here in the US.

And uni is still not my favorite. It seemed better in Japan than what I’ve had here, but it will still never top my list.

Filed under:
Japanese, Lunch, World traveller by Courtney