Saturday, March 24, 2012

Seared Tuna with Piperade

What does Williams-Sonoma Essentials of French Cooking bring us this week? Seared Tuna with Piperade – yum!



The Aquitaine region is in the south-western part of France near the Atlantic ocean near the Pyrennes mountain range, bordering Spain. I’ll bet that would be a nice place to live. (This now is added to my ex-pat places to retire list)

Piperade is a typical Basque dish prepared with onion, green peppers, and sauteed tomatoes I recently read the coloring reflect the colors of the Basque flag (red, green and white). How about that?



Ingredients..........

2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion
Green and red bell peppers, cut length wise into strips
Tomatoes
Garlic clove
½ teaspoon sweet paprika
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
Tuna steaks about ¾ inch thick

Warm olive oil, add onion and sauté 2 to 3 minutes. Now add green and red peppers and sauté until soft.

Stir in tomatoes, garlic, salt, pepper, sugar, sweet paprika and cayenne. Let this thicken…perhaps 20 minutes or less will do it.

Prepare your cast iron skillet. I love this lodge skillet ! Place on medium high heat and sprinkle evenly with salt. When hot, add tuna and sear on one side, turn and sear the other side. Do not overcook as you want the pink in the middle. Transfer to a warm plate and place piperade over it.



This was melt in your mouth texture...and so good. The wine was good. The company is always good.

Next up from this cookbook is a steak or chicken dish. Can’t decide yet. Preferences from anyone? I am always open to suggestion.

9 comments:

  1. I love the sound of htat piperade topping! I'm thinking it would make a great summer bruschetta as well!

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  2. I love piperade with scrambled eggs (http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/main-ingredient/eggs/piperade.html) too - this looks delicious Tina! And seared tuna - double yum!

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  3. I think the piperade could be used for so many dishes and it would all be different....depending on which meat, if any, you served it on. Bruschetta is an excellent idea Joanne. Never thought about it over eggs, Jo. Thanks for the ideas!

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  4. Love piperade; it seems perfect with almost anything; all ingredients that we enjoy. We have never cooked tuna and this makes this sound very tempting.
    Rita

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  5. Love this pepper saute, kinda reminds me of a recpe I worked on a while back much similar using Basque flavors which are also found in many recipes along our bay area as the coastal region has many similarities... native satsumas brought a great depth to the peppers and other vegetables ... will be sharing if I can ever get the cookbook published...

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  6. Rita, this can just go over anything, I like it too.

    Drick, let me know the publication date!

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  7. Simply delicious to look at, Tina. I really should prepare some as a stand by. Piperade is yummy and oh so versatile. (didn't know about the flag colors, cool:)

    Thanks for sharing...

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  8. Thanks so much Louise! I like your lobster newburg post at your place

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