The trick isn't having a good recipe, it's finding people that like the recipe you use! <g Good tuna salad should start with good tuna. Not chunk lite, but the lowball end would be chunk white (just above cat food). More preferable would be real tuna cooked fresh. Albacore tuna in the can works but it's not enough in a 6 oz can to make more than one good sandwich, which makes it a couple of bucks per sandwich. Still, maybe just a rich cat's catfood, but it's edible. Yellow fin tuna is absolutely gorgeous in a salad, either on a nest of lettuce or on bread. Relish doesn't mean anything since there are as many relishes as there are pickles. Celery works if you take out the veins. Otherwise it's going to be chewy long after the rest of the bite is gone (you can do this by using a knife, slice into the front of the stalk, break backwards, and strip away the highly fiberous veins running the length of the stalk. If you cook the celery first it will A) become more sweet, and
break down that fiber, but fresh is the best way because it adds texture. Hot sauce could mean anything. Find a hot sauce you can take a taste of and like without the heat killing you and you've got the hot sauce. Personally, I don't believe in hot sauce for a tuna salad sandwich. If you want hot, sprinkle a very few red pepper flakes over the salad once you've got it on bread. If you don't want bread, use lettuce as a bed and still put a few flakes over it. It's nice to have something just a little different in each bite. Adding sauce means that it all becomes hot, not just a bite here and there. Mustard is also a questionable ingredient, not because it's mustard, but because there are so many kinds. Mustard also acts as a coagulent, so it holds salads together much as an egg does. Feel free to substitute egg if you don't like mustard and make enough for 4 people (one egg goes a long way, but the salad must be eaten immediately). Otherwise try it with your favorite mustard in just portions of a teaspoon until you get it right (always taste what you're making because if you won't eat it, how could you expect someone else to eat it?) Mayo isn't an ingredient to me. I use it to moisten the bread (depends on the type of bread, but mostly it's a spread, not an ingredient). It tends to make tuna or chicken salad, or even crab salad too runny (hard to gauge and impossible to take out). It also compliments the tomato slices better if it's not in the salad. Again, if it's a real salad, then lay the lettuce bed down, plop just a little mayo down and place the tuna mix. Tomatoes as a side, a little salt (kosher is consistent, coarse is huge and works best on boiled potatos, sea salt is questionable) and freshly ground black pepper and you've got it - mostly. Things people don't tell you but include. Sweet onions, either sauteed or raw (sauteed gives additional sweetness that raw doesn't. A few drops of fresh lemon (lime works better to me, but lemon is for fish) Fennel (licorice taste somewhat like anise) or Dill weed (not Dill seed which is good for pickling). Chives work great, as does parsley (or a combination) and basil works quite well over the tomatoes (fresh for tomatoes, and a chiffinod, please). Serve with chilled gerkins and chips. Bread and butter pickles will work, but not my favorite. One last secret ingrediant if you use tomatoes is a very nice balsamic vinegar. Just a drop on each tomato slice. Also excellent for dipping with pizza. However, understand that really good balsamic vinegar can run $80 to $120 per small bottle. Run of the mill balsamic that costs $4 for 12 oz is shit, but if it's the best you can afford, it's still better than no balsamic. And there you have it. Mix and match until you like what you have.
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