"My Grandpa Makes the Tuna..." (Tuna Casserole with Spinach)

I am not a snob.  Ask those who know me and I am pretty sure *fingers crossed* they would say that "snobby" is not an adjective that describes me.  Basically, it is like this: I don't care if my clothes come from Target or some fancy-pants store, as long as they fit well and are cute.  I don't care if my friends are quote-unquote "popular" or the average Joe, as long as they are kind and not too annoying (because face it, we all have some annoying characteristics).  I don't care if I drive a BMW or a Toyota, as long as it is reliable and safe.  Shoot -- my first car was an '88 Dodge Colt Hatchback, ripped vinyl seating and rusty top included.  I drove it with pride.

Like I said, I am not a snob.

Unless it comes to peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or tuna casserole.  Then you better have the right stuff.  AKA Skippy Creamy and Strawberry Smuckers (for the PB&J) or this stuff:

Yes, that's right.  Campbell's all the way, Baby.  None of that store-brand junk they try to pass off as Cream of Mushroom Soup.  And don't even think about trying to sneak in some "low-fat" goo, I will tell the difference in a heartbeat. 

There are some things in life you are allowed to be snobby about.

Mayo is another one of those things.

Bring out the Best Foods, and you bring out the best, right?

And tuna, well... there is only one kind that sits on my shelf:

But for the tuna I have a really good excuse, other than just pure snobbiness.  See, my grandpa was an engineer for Starkist before he retired (and don't ask me what an engineer might do at a tuna company, I have yet to figure that out...)  As a kid I watched the movie Annie and it inspired many things in me.  For one, I knew that I had to work in an orphanage some day.  Actually, I knew I had to buy Daddy Warbuck's house and move all the orphans there so they could have a happy life.  This is still something I have on my life's to-do list.

Something else this movie inspired in me was the need to burst out in song to express myself.  Annie did it, why couldn't I?  This is why I would sing to my cats, my dogs, and my friends, until they ran away and hid.  But my poor mother, she couldn't run and hide, now could she?  (She could regret her idea of renting Annie, however.)  This would be how the Grandpa song came about.  I remember sitting there in the little seat in the shopping carts, cruising the aisles of the supermarket, singing at the top of my lungs --

My grandpa makes the tuna,

my grandpa makes the tuna,

so if you love tuna

YOU LOVE MY GRANDPA!

Ya know what?  I don't think I have ever purchased a different brand of tuna in my life, except when I was living overseas and Starkist was not an option.  The seed was planted early on, and nothing has uprooted it.  So, yes, I am a tuna snob.  I admit it.

I was making tuna casserole the other night, with my perfect ingredients, and I realized I didn't have peas.  But I did have spinach, and I thought, "Why not?"  Then, as it was cooking, I flipped through Everyday Food by Martha Stuart and I saw a recipe for, you guessed it, tuna casserole with spinach.  I'm one step ahead of you, Martha... Anyway, it turned out great.  I like peas, but I like spinach.  I think this will get another chance in the spotlight, as long as I have my Campbell's, Best Foods, and Starkist of course!

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 pack egg noodles
• 2 cans tuna
• 2 cans cream of mushroom soup
• 1 heaping Tablespoon of mayonnaise
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/4 onion, chopped
• 2 large handfuls of spinach leaves
• Mrs. Dash or other seasoning
• salt and pepper, to taste
• bread crumbs

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 425.  Bring water to boil in large pot and add egg noodles.  Cook for 7-8 min.
2. Meanwhile, in large mixing bowl add the rest of the ingredients except the bread crumbs.  Stir in egg noodles after they are cooked and drained.
3. In large casserole dish, dump contents in and sprinkle bread crumbs on top.  Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 40 minutes.  (Remove the tin foil for the last 5-7 minutes to give it a golden crispiness on the top.)

Cost: $6.70                   Cost Per Serving (6) $1.12

Plus bread w/ butter and salad = $1.60 per serving

An All American Classic: Tuna Casserole

My love of tuna came early on.  It might be attributed to the fact that my grandpa worked at the Starkist headquarters and therefore I had a lot of it when we were visiting him.  In fact, when I was a little girl with pigtails in my hair and small enough to still sit in the chair on the shopping carts, my mom would push me around the grocery store, checking off her list, while I would be singing, "My Grandma makes the tuna, my grandpa makes the tuna.  If you love tuna then YOU LOVE MY GRANDPA!"  (This was during my phase when I did not yet realize that the world was not a musical like "Annie".  This singing was not limited to just tuna.  My poor mother.)

Later, after years of tuna sandwiches for lunch (alternately switched with PB&J... no turkey and cheese for me, no sirree!), I hit a vegetarian streak in my life.  I gave up chicken and hamburgers without that much of a problem.  But I sure did miss those tuna sandwiches!  Luckily for me, there was Tuno.  Yes, Tun-O.  Looks kind of like tuna, smells kind of like tuna, comes in a can like tuna.  Except that can doesn't just say, "Dolphin friendly" on it.  Oh no, it says, "Tuna and dolphin friendly".  I don't think it was soybean friendly, though...  Apparently I liked it enough because I ate so much of it that for Christmas I got a shipping box full of cans of Tuno.

I kid you not.

I snapped out of this fake-meat mode when I moved for a bit to the beautiful islands of Micronesia to teach school.  You don't eat fake meat in Micronesia, you eat fresh-from-the-sea meat or chicken-snatched-from-the-bushes meat.  That, and canned meat.  Spam, people LOVE spam over there.  Me?  Spam?  Nah.  But the love of canned tuna came back along with the experience of eating fish straight off the bone.  Both were delicious, but only one made a killer sandwich.  Tuna sandwiches, tuna dip, grilled tuna Reuben's... I was the Bubba Gump of tuna.

(Enjoying some of that fresh fish in Ebeye)

This being said, I guess there should be no surprise that we eat a lot of tuna casserole in our home.  The great thing is that even though this is a simple food, the Brazilian half of our extended family thinks that it is a gourmet dish simply because it is not common in Brazil.  Imagine my relief when I have the pressure of making something fabulous to feed my mother/father/sister/aunts/uncles/cousins-in-law and they ask, "Ooohhh, do you think you can make tuna casserole?"  And then they turn and smile at each other, sending the same message back and forth: Tonight we are going to be eating GOOD!

The great thing about this dish is there is no-one-way to do it.  Basically, if you have the main ingredients of Cream of Something (mushroom or celery) Soup, Tuna, and noodles, you can change it up however you want.  Below is the Tiffany version of Tuna Casserole.  I make it without a recipe and sometimes add more or less, but this is what I did today and it was great.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 pack egg noodles
• 2 cans tuna
• 2 cans cream of mushroom soup
• 1 heaping Tablespoon of mayonnaise
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/4 onion, chopped
• 1 half bag of frozen peas
• Mrs. Dash or other seasoning
• salt and pepper, to taste
• bread crumbs

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 425.  Bring water to boil in large pot and add egg noodles.  Cook for 7-8 min.
2. Meanwhile, in large mixing bowl add the rest of the ingredients except the bread crumbs.  Stir in egg noodles after they are cooked and drained.
3. In large casserole dish, dump contents in and sprinkle bread crumbs on top.  Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 40 minutes.  (Remove the tin foil for the last 5-7 minutes to give it a golden crispiness on the top.)

COST = $6.70        PER SERVING (4) = $1.68
Plus bread w/ butter and sliced tomatoes = $1.93 per serving