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Hook, line and sinker

Step 1: First catch your tuna — the author with more than 77kg of fresh tuna.

Our resident butcher STEVE BAIN is all at sea this month, baiting us with his tuna back steaks.

This month we’re processing tuna that gets precooked as a ‘steak’ for use in niçoise salad as flakes of tuna.

The large ‘chunks’ of meat shown in the photos are boneless pieces that come from the back/dorsal of a tuna.

These slabs of prime tuna are cut crossways into steaks that are then cooked in your frying pan.

After cooking, they will break into flakes that are used in the salad (see Lynne’s recipe on page 34).

As part of the process, after being trimmed into steak sized and shaped pieces, the tuna is kept cool for a while (often overnight in an iced slurry).

Note that there is some debate around whether or not to allow the steaks to make direct contact with the iced water slurry — all will be revealed, so read on.

Step 2: These tuna back fillets were stored in sealed plastics bags for two days in a cooler filled with an iced slurry. The plastic satchels were fully immersed. As a side discussion, if you are making sashimi or sushi then one school of thought is to absolutely ensure that the flesh does not make contact with the water. Therefore, as in this case, the fillets are stored in vacuum-sealed food-grade plastic sleeves. However, with cooked tuna steaks, some eaters like a little leeching to have occurred prior to cooking, and water contact after cutting them into steaks can achieve this. Hence, to soak for a while in direct contact with the water is okay if your steaks are intended for the frying pan.
Step 3: Cut the tuna into thick slices.
Step 4: These steaks have been cut with the skin on.
Step 5: This variation shows some steaks cut away from the skin (that is, skinless steaks).
Step 6: A skin-on steak ready for further processing.
Step 7: Cut the skin away from the steak.
Step 8: Just for completeness, this image shows the ‘shiny’ side of the skin that has been cut away.
Step 9: Now cut away the blood-line from the clear-fleshed steak. (Some will be happy to leave this on — your call.)
Step 10: This is where it gets interesting. We often put some of our tuna steaks in the fridge in iced water overnight prior to cooking them in the frying pan. The remaining steaks we cook straight away. In taste comparisons, most regular tuna eaters prefer the non-soaked steaks. However, those looking to approximate canned tuna say that the bathed tuna steaks are their preference.
Step 11: In the frying pan, the ‘white’ tuna steak on the left has been soaked overnight in water and the pink steak on the right is the unsoaked ‘fish-eaters’ method. Here the steaks are topped with a little 'crust' for flavouring and extra twist and crunch to the salad. In the frying pan with a little oil, simply cook the steaks all the way through to the centre from each side (flip them once) and then you can flake them ready for niçoise salad.

Steve Bain