Spiced Tuna with Mediterranean Wine Sauce

I'm always puzzled when presented with a nice tuna steak to cook.   So many recipes have  tomato-based sauce that overwhelms the subtle flavor of the meat. This wine-sauced dish has become one of our favorites because the crushed fennel seed crust highlights the tuna's flavor, and the wine sauce.... well, just make sure you have a crusty baguette loaf to sop up every drop. I think this also works well with a chicken cutlet that's been pounded thin.

4 servings

 Ingredients

1 cup dry white wine, divided

8 sun-dried tomato halves, packed without oil

1 tablespoon orange juice

2 teaspoons fennel seeds

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

1 tablespoon olive oil, divided

1/2 teaspoon salt, divided

1/2 teaspoon grated orange rind

2 garlic cloves, crushed

4 (6-ounce) tuna steaks (about 1 inch thick)

Cooking spray

3 tablespoons chopped pitted Greek olives

1/4 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper

2 cups hot cooked angel hair pasta (about 4 ounces uncooked pasta)

1/4 cup (1 ounce) grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Preparation

Combine 1/2 cup wine and tomato halves in a 1-cup glass measure. Cover with plastic wrap, and fold back a corner to vent. Microwave at high 1-1/2 minutes or until mixture boils; let

stand, covered, 15 minutes. Strain tomatoes through a sieve into a bowl,

reserving liquid; chop tomatoes. Add chopped tomatoes, 1/2 cup wine, and

orange juice to the reserved tomato liquid; set aside.

Place fennel seeds and peppercorns in a spice or coffee grinder: process until

finely ground. Pour into a small bowl; stir in 1 teaspoon oil, 1/4 teaspoon salt, orange rind, and garlic. Spread spice mixture evenly over 1 side of each tuna steak. Heat 1 teaspoon oil in a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat; add steaks, crust sides down, to skillet. Cook for 5 minutes on each side or until fish is medium-rare or desired degree of doneness. Remove from heat; keep warm. Add wine mixture, 1/4 teaspoon salt,

olives, and black pepper to skillet; cook until reduced to 1/2 cup (about 3

minutes). Combine pasta, 1 teaspoon oil, and cheese in a bowl; toss well.

Serve tuna over pasta; drizzle with wine sauce.

Recipe originally from Cooking Light www.myrecipes.com/recipe/spiced-tuna-with-mediterranean-wine-sauce

First Place Blueberry Pie

One of my most enduring conquests in competing in fairs is making pies. Learning that the judging was based on the prominence of the fruit flavor, it took me awhile to make sure that I didn't keep adding spices and other flavors that would mask it. And getting the right, flaky but tender crust is always a fun challenge. Enjoy!

First Place Blueberry Pie

4 1/2 - 5 cups blueberries (fresh or not thawed if frozen)

3/4 Cup sugar

3/4 Cup water (or juice from blueberries is thawed from frozen)

4 Tablespoons corn starch (mixed with 1/4 cup water)

1 teaspoon lemon zest

2 tablespoons butter

Double pie crust**

Preheat oven to 425

Cook sugar and water until boiling - add one cup of blueberries

Simmer for several minutes

Combine corn starch with 1/4 cup water and stir into boiling blueberry mixture

Cook, (stirring constantly) until liquid becomes very think and clear

Poor hot blueberry mixture into bowl with remaining blueberries and stir.

Add lemon zest and butter, stir, and let cool to almost room temperature

Pour into prepared pie crust and top with remaining crust (either whole or lattice) and flute edges to seal

Cut air slits if whole top crust is used or make decorative cutouts

Cover edges of crust with pie rim or aluminum foil (recommendation)

Bake on a cookie sheet for 15 minutes

Turn temperature down to 350 and bake around 30 minutes longer or until instant thermometer is at 200

Cool pie to room temperature before slicing.

** Pie crust for double

2 1/2 cups flour

3/4 cups butter flavored Crisco shortening

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

1 egg 

1 teaspoon white vinegar

5-6 tablespoons ice water

Pulse first 6 items in food processor until resembles corn meal

Slowly add ice water and pulse until it comes together and forms a ball

Pull together in ball with as little handling as possible and form into disc.

Cover with saran wrap and refrigerate at least 30 minutes before rolling out

Who are Jane & Lois?

Jane and Lois are friends and neighbors in a small town in rural coastal Virginia.  Their shared love of cooking and baking led to sharing recipes and a little healthy competition for outdoing each other with gourmet treats.

Jane is an award winning baker and specialist in canning and preserving.  Her name is regularly on the list of top winners at county and state fairs in Maryland, Virginia and Delaware.  Among her accomplishments are 1,700 ribbons (over 1,000 blue) and 12 best of show awards. She loves the friendly competion and comraderie and has even trained and become a certified judge in the tri state area.  Outside of baking, candy making and canning, her cooking style is fairly traditional American faire with some dabbling into ethnic arenas. 

Lois is an adventurous cook specializing in bread baking and ethnic foods from all over the world.  Her flavors tend to be spicy and have deep unami.  Meat'n'potato meals are very rare in her household. Trying new recipes is the norm, and a dish that gets repeated has passed a high bar for tastiness.  She has been baking bread for 40+ years.

We hope to share some recipes with you that we feel are interesting and will delight you.  Some will be old family recipes, some will be treasures from other modern chefs, some will be original.  All will be delicious.