Two cans, identical in every way except for a little sticker on the top of one that said ‘no salt added’. So, we opened both cans (salted and unsalted) and did a side-by-side comparison. Both cans contained 6-ounces of light colored Albacore tuna in its own juice. Both had the same amount of natural juices in them and were almost devoid of fragrance.
We only tasted the very tiniest of differences, but it was so slight as to not be discernible. In other words, not enough salt is added to the salt version to salt your whole recipe, unlike some of the grocery store varieties.
We were really surprised at the firmness of the fish, and yet it was flaky and moist. This is not your ordinary tuna fish. When we talked to the owner, he gave us the scoop on why his fish is so mild, light colored and firm. It is in the way he processes the tuna. All his tuna are young (no older than three years) so that their mercury content is extremely low, all are caught by line, not netted, all are landed on foam so that they do not bruise, and all are killed and bled immediately. Then, after being rinsed several times, they are flash frozen. Other tuna fishers catch the big tuna, (filled with mercury) and send the whole fish into the cannery. This is because they get paid more for the weight…even though that weight is not what you want to be eating!
This is the way that canned tuna is supposed to taste: clean, mercury-free, sealed into the can and cooked in its own juices. The result is so mild you’d almost think it was chicken. And by the way, this makes an excellent tuna fish salad!
