Merry Christmas everyone!

In this fantastic festive season, we would like to thank your continued support, especially in from last year my posting activity has reduced due to work commitment. Now finally the end of year break has started, I want to share, with you all, South Australia’s very own southern blue fin tuna, Mori Tuna!

Mori Seafood is second generation family business located in South Australia’s premium seafood region, Port Lincoln. The company aims to share South Australia’s world class seafood produce by implementing best practice in their processes to ensure sustainable catchment of the seafood.

As many of my readers are aware, I have been promoting South Australian produce for almost seven years using this blog and featured a large variety of producers. Mori Tuna is a product that gained my wow factor by first sight, for a number of reasons. These days it is fairly hard to see any blue fin tuna in the market. I’ve visited a lot, literally a lot, of seafood shops and factories in Adelaide, aiming to find a blue fin tuna product, but all I saw were yellow fins. Also, the belly part of the tuna is considered as a delicacy. I tried them in Japan previously. They are absolutely divine and melt in the mouth!

I got the product from Ferguson Australia. They have the product in their online store. It is a middle belly or, using its Japanese name, Chu-toro. In Japanese classifications, tuna can yield akami (red meat), chutoro (middle belly meat) and otoro (pink fatty belly) while otoro is the highest priced followed by chutoro. The product is selling at AUD $59 for 1-4 kg pack. It is much reasonable and cheaper than it is in Japanese market which 1-2 sushi pieces would cost $10-20.

The tuna portion I got can be divided into three sections, as shown below. Below the red line is the fatty chutoro part (Part 1). This part can be used for making sushi, mostly nigiri.

The second part is between the red line and the yellow circle (Part 2). The meat in this part is similar to the texture of a tuna steak and can be used to cook such dishes. I included 3 recipes below.

The third part is within the yellow circle (Part 3). This part of the flesh is quite dark in color, indicating the deposition of blood. It also has a strong fish flavour. If you cannot tolerate, discard this part, otherwise, you can use it to make a stew or pan-fry with salt and pepper to serve with salad/rice.

Chutoro Nigiri

This sushi dish used the part that below the red line as shown above. Once the three part has been cut into appropriate portions, take away the skin and the excessive fat or joining tissues of the meat. This will give the pure chutoro fatty part. The next step is to take a twister and peel the flesh with its fibre trend and you will have the following. I am not so fussed about the shapes so I left the flesh with what it looks like. You may want to trim off the ends to make the dish prettier.

Once this portion of the meat has been completed peeled as above, they can go onto the rice to make a sushi nigiri. I had a very detailed post on various types of sushi and how to cook the sushi rice. Follow my previous post on the steps and ingredients involved.

The only thing to add for this dish is that after putting the fish on the rice, brush the outer side with some sushi soy sauce and enjoy as soon as possible. This will make the sushi super tasty and ultimately fresh! Enjoy 🙂

Blue Fin Tuna Tataki

Tataki is another personal all-time favorite and is very easy to make. To put it simple, wrap tuna steak with sesame seeds and pan fry it until the outside is just cooked. A detailed recipe is shown below.

The tuna steak is obtained from the Part 2 as indicated above.

Ingredients

70 g         Mori Tuna fillet steak – trimmed to a triangle shape (as shown below)

Lots of    Sesame seeds

1 tsp        Kewpie Japanese wasabi mayinnaise

3 tbsp      Black herring roe caviar

Steps

1. Lay the sesame seeds on a plate and place the fish onto the sesame seeds and make sure all sides of the fish are covered with the seeds.

2. Oil in the pan and put on high heat until just smoking. Place the fish from step 1 into the pan and sear for 20 seconds each side (3 sides in total).

3. Remove the fish from heat and slice into 2cm thich slices.

4. Arrange the fish slices onto the plate.

5. On the side of the fish, spread the wasabi mayo and the herring roe caviar.

The overall taste of the dish is very tantalising with the fragrant flavour from the fried sesame seeds, the delicate yet raw tuna and the saltiness from the caviar while the wasabi mayo improving the mouthfeel and balancing all flavours!

Battered Tuna Steak

This is a rather creation myself. Seriously, I have not seen such recipes anywhere else. It maintains the raw flavour of the tuna while adding on the crunchiness of the batter. Detailed steps below.

Ingredients

70 g         Mori Tuna fillet steak – trimmed to a square shape (as shown below)

Some      Nori sheets (sushi seaweed sheet)

Handful Japanese pickled ginger

Soy sauce

Steps

1.Make the batter via the steps below.

62.5 g Plain flour

20 g Corn flour

1.5 g Baking powder

1.5 g Dry yeast

100 g Water

Mix them up thoroughly until it looks like a paste. The amount of batter is enough for around 250g of tuna.

2. Season the tuna steak with salt and pepper. Wrap with the seaweed sheet, making sure it is wrapped tightly.

3. Dip the wrapped tuna into the batter from step 1 lightly and fry in hot oil until the batter is light golden color.

4. Rest on a tray to allow excess oil to drip. Then cut into slices as shown below.

5. Serve with soy sauce and Japanese pickled ginger

The crunchy batter and the soft pink tuna flesh makes the best combination on the palate! While the ginger adds on extra refreshment, the soy sauce also enhanced the tuna flavour ：）

Ryukyu Tuna Sashimi

This is more of a serving suggestion rather than a full recipe. The tuna used for this dish is from both Part 1 and Part 2 tuna portion of the chutoro as discussed previously, including trimmings. The full recipe for this dish can be found in my previous post on Adelaidefoodies.com.

The flavour of this dish is fantastic, especially with some of the fatty trimmings becoming jelly like structures. And all pieces melt in the mouth completely!!! The Mori Tuna product enhanced this experience with its high premium quality and the ever-fragrant tuna smell! I absolutely love it….