Monday, May 11, 2020

Adventures in cheap packaged foods: Bumble Bee Sun-Dried Tomato & Basil Seasoned Tuna

Today we have another selection from the world of seasoned tuna. As well as a special guest food critic.

I’m sun-dried tomato fan. And a big basil fan. (I was a loyal customer of a particular pizza-by-the-slice joint in my San Francisco neighborhood because they had basil shakers rather than oregano.) So a combination of the two with tuna? No hesitation.


And, yeah, I think it’s pretty good. However, it’s too vinegary for Lou. He said he might mix it with diced onions and mayonnaise. (But, Lou, mayo has vinegar in it, too.)

So, why is a tuna and salmon company named Bumble Bee? Well, it does roll off the tongue easier than Columbia River Packers Association, or any of the other names it had over the years.

8 comments:

  1. Mayo does not have vinegar. It's an egg with oil emulsion that is often flavored with a little mustard. At least that's the recipe I use.

    I do like the sun-dried tomato and dried basil tuna mixture but it's cheaper to make my own of that, too. Although it make more dishes to wash if you normally eat your tuna right from the package.

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    1. Unless you use dry mustard, it has vinegar in it too.

      But most (if not all) commercial mayonnaise lists vinegar -- distilled and/or cider -- as an ingredient.

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  2. For a point of reference this is what the FDA says anything that has mayo on the label is: Mayonnaise is regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Standard of Identity. It must contain at least 65% oil by weight, vinegar, and egg or egg yolks. There are lots of recipes around for mayonnaise, some use lemon juice as the acidic ingredient. Commercial mustard preparations are made with vinegar or lemon juice so if you are adding commercial mustard then you are also adding acid to the recipe and quite likely there is vinegar in the mustard.

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  3. Alan, here is something for your food adventure reading. I have been experimenting with it when cooking. I even bought a small bottle of fish sauce to try. It does not make things taste fishy, you don't use a lot of it anyway but it certainly does make things taste more savory, which is something humans crave. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umami

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    1. "...and commonly added to some foods in the form of monosodium glutamate." Yes, I'm a big user of MSG. Some people say it's bad, which is why most restaurants in SF's China Town have signs declaring NO MSG. My Chinese coworker laughed at those signs. "It's a lie. Chinese food without MSG is like Italian food without garlic. So they're using MSG."

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  4. How do they get bees to work in their plants, clever. Is that why our bee populations are dwindling? What's the world coming to?

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