Fennel, White Bean, and Tuna Gratin

Sunday should be sunny and a perfect day for a stroll to the Fairmount Neighborhood Farmers Market to pick up some colorful produce from Camas Swale Farm and recapture the fleeting flavors of summer.

Last week I picked up a fennel bulb, which I love to cook in a fennel and sardine pasta with lemony breadcrumbs. But then this recipe for a white bean and tuna gratin caught my fancy, because it reminded me both of a favorite white bean and tuna salad and Julia Child's salmon gratin from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, volume 1, which my mother used to cook as a regular weeknight meal. Certain of my childhood dishes don't translate well to my children's taste, who prefer bright, fresh flavors to cream sauces. I've already reengineered Julia's dish of a creamy gratin, laced with white vermouth and sprinkling of gruyere cheese, as salmon and barely cakes, but truth be told, frying patties is more work than sticking a casserole in the oven. I liked the idea of including legumes in a gratin and lightening it up with fennel and lemon. 

This is the resulting dish, packed with fragrant fennel and topped with a crunchy lemony bread crumb and gruyere crust. It was delicious eaten with kamut and roasted broccoli and red peppers, fresh from the farm.

Fennel, White Bean, and Tuna Gratin

served four

1 fennel bulb
1 small onion or 2 shallots
3 Tbsp butter
3 Tbsp flour
1 tin tuna in olive oil
1 cup milk, heated to just below scalding
1/4 cup white vermouth
juice from 1 small lemon
3 cups cooked white beans (from 1 cup dried, or 2 15 ounce cans)
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup grated gruyere cheese
1 cup bread crumbs
1 handful fennel fronds
zest from 1 small lemon

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Dice the fennel bulb and the onion and reserve a few fennel fronds for the bread crumb topping. Zest and juice 1 small lemon. Combine the bread crumbs, lemon zest, chopped fennel fronds, and gruyere and reserve.

2. Heat a large skillet and melt the butter. Add the diced fennel and sauté until glassy. Add the diced onion and sauté until both are very soft, about 10 minutes. Add the olive oil from the tuna tin, then add the flour and whisk into the fat. Continue whisking as you slowly add the hot milk to make a light roux. Add the white vermouth and lemon juice. Generously salt and pepper. Remove from the heat and gently fold in the white beans and tuna. 

3. Pour the white bean and tuna mixture into a 9 inch square oven proof dish. Top with the bread crumb mixture.  Bake at 425 degrees for about 30 minutes, until the mixture is bubbling and the bread crumb topping is nicely browned. Serve with whole grains such as wheat berries, barley, or kamut.

Slow Roasted Romas and Olive Oil Poached Tuna Salad

This Sunday at at the Fairmount Neighborhood Farmers Market, you can look forward to a selection of pastured chicken, lamb, and pork cuts from Fair Valley Farm, handcrafted vegan hazelnut cheese from Avellana Creamery, and beautiful fresh cut flower bouquets from Tiger Lily Art Company. Good Food Easy at Sweetwater Farm will have the following offerings:  

Fresh
corn on the cob (make corn and tomato salsa for fish tacos)
cantaloupes, peaches, and Italian prune plums (for Zwetschgenkuchen)
Gravenstein apples from SLO farm (make some roasted apple sauce)
lots of tomatoes, including cherries and flats of roams (slow roast, below)
sweet and hot peppers of all kinds peppers (pick up some spicy ones for these lettuce wraps)
eggplants and broccoli (try this roasted eggplant and broccoli salad)
green and yellow beans and potatoes (make a Salade Nicoise, below)
tomatillos (try this slow cooker pork and beans) 
daikon radish, fennel, and cucumbers (make pickles)
baby beets, carrots, and kohlrabi (try grilled)
crookneck squash, summer squash, and zucchini (grill with falafel)
cabbage (green, red, savoy) (make this Chinese cabbage with vinegar)
radicchio, chard, kale, lettuce, including bagged mix 
garlic and fresh herbs (basil, oregano, sage, thyme) and home-grown lemon grass

Preserves, Beans, and Grains
From Sweet Creek Foods:
Dill Pickles, Chili Dill Pickles, Bread 'N Butter Pickles, Pickle Relish
Blueberry, Strawberry, Blackberry, and Raspberry Fruit Spreads
Enchilada Sauce and Salsa
From SLO Farm: Applesauce
Assorted beans and grains from Camas Country Mill

Be sure to savor the end of summer this Labor Day weekend with a trip to the Fairmount Neighborhood Farmers Market for some pretty tomatoes and flowers, and perhaps a stop at Eugene City Bakery for coffee and treats. Labor Day weekend is also a good time to devote to preserving some of summer's bounty for the winter months ahead.

This past weekend I slow roasted about six pounds of Sweeter Farm roma tomatoes, a project that requires very little effort (halve the tomatoes) but lots of time (10 to 12 hours at 200 degrees C) and is best undertaken overnight, meaning that you awaken to intense tomato fumes and a craving for an English breakfast. These tomatoes can be frozen for addition to pasta sauces, bean or grain salads, pizza, and wintertime BLTs, but we already made major inroads into our stash before I could freeze any of them. They proved to be especially tasty as a bed on which to layer olive oil poached fresh Oregon albacore tuna for a fancy Salade Nicoise. You can't see the roasted tomatoes in the photo below, but they are doing their job infusing the fish with extra flavor from below. I'll be picking up another flat of roma tomatoes this weekend for additional Labor Day projects.

Slow Roasted Roma Tomatoes

about 6 pounds of tomatoes for two large baking sheets 

Wash the tomatoes and slice them in half. Drizzle a few tablespoons of olive oil on a rimmed baking sheet, spread out the oil over the bottom of the pan, and sprinkle on a generous pinch of salt. You could also scatter over some fresh herbs such as thyme or marjoram and a few whole cloves of garlic. Arrange the roma tomato halves snuggly on the sheet. I arranged them cut side down, which let them stew in the olive oil, but I've also seen recipes that put them cut side up, which would dry them out more and caramelize them a little. I fit about 3 lbs of tomatoes per large baking sheet. Slow roast them at 200 degrees for 10-12 hours. This works well if you do it overnight, although the delicious roasted tomato smells may wake you up early in the morning. Cool them and freeze them in freezer bags for use in salads, pasta dishes, pizzas, BLTs, etc.

Olive Oil Poached Tuna

fresh albacore tuna (about 4 ounces per person)

olive oil

salt and pepper

4 peeled garlic cloves

sprigs of fresh herbs such as thyme and marjoram

Slice the tuna into 1 1/2 inch cutlet. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and allow the fish to warm up to room temperature. Arrange the tuna pieces into the smallest saucepan that will hold them in a single layer and then pour over enough olive oil to cover the fish. Add the garlic cloves and herbs, submerging them as well. Bring the oil to a gentle simmer over low heat. You can monitor the temperature of the oil with a kitchen thermometer, and it should not get above 150 degrees. Cook the tuna for about 10 minutes or until desired opacity, then turn off the heat and remove the tuna from the oil. Smash the garlic cloves into the oil and allow to cool. Strain the oil and reserve. This fragrant oil can be refrigerated for a week and used in salad dressing (see below) or in a sauce such as a quick puttanesca made with slow roasted roma tomatoes.

Slow Roasted Romas and Olive Oil Poached Tuna Salad

slow roasted roma tomatoes (recipe above)

olive oil poached tuna (recipe above)

green and yellow beans, trimmed and boiled until just tender (about 4 minutes)

small potatoes boiled until cooked through

lettuce leaves, washed

cherry tomatoes

hard boiled eggs (add to cold water, turn off heat when water boils, let sit 6 minutes, drain)

salt and pepper

1/3 cup strained olive oil from the tuna poaching

3 Tbsp sherry vinegar

On a large platter, arrange a layer of slow roasted roma tomatoes. As soon as the tuna is poached, place it on the layer of roma tomatoes to infuse the flavors. Around the edges of the platter, arrange lettuce leaves, potatoes, beans, and halved hard boiled eggs. Scatter the cherry tomatoes over the tuna. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. When you are ready to serve, whisk together the oil and vinegar and pour most over the perimeter lettuce, beans, and potatoes and a little over the central fish. Enjoy with fresh bread.

Easy flageolet bean and tuna salad lunch

I sometimes marvel at the fact that I seem to spend so many of my waking hours packing lunches, and then I end up with nothing to eat when noon comes around at work. 

This is due in part to the sheer exhaustion induced by the daily chore of packing lunches for two kids with multiple externally imposed restriction (no peanuts or tree nuts at elementary school, no ovoid or hard choking hazards at child care) and personal preferences (one carbohydrate-loving vegetarian, one protein-loving omnivore). I must say that I am a fan of these Lunchsense lunch boxes, created by a neighborhood mother, that facilitate the lunch creation process (above: sunflower butter sandwich, sliced fruit, edamame and carrots, yogurt with a side of cereal to sprinkle on top). Still, after all the effort of filling eight separate compartments with nutritious and appealing food, I have no energy to pack lunch for myself. 


This week, however, I came up with an easy and delicious grownup lunch, thanks to having cooked up a double batch of heirloom green flageolet beans from Lonesome Whistle Farm.

This is a take on the Tuscan classic of a white bean and tuna salad. I mixed up a quick mustard vinaigrette and added in a can of tuna in olive oil (a great pantry staple for many dishes including salade Nicoise. During graduate school in the Bay Area I waged a private campaign to get Trader Joe's to carry tuna in olive oil by incessantly filling out customer suggestion forms; I feel a slight sense of triumph that it is now widely available). To this mixture, I add the beans and some chopped parsley (we can only dream of vine-ripe tomatoes that would be a delicious addition in the summer). Voila, an instant gourmet lunch, along with some crusty baguette from Eugene City Bakery. And best of all, one batch will last for several days, improving in flavor and alleviating the need to pack another lunch.

Green Flageolet Bean and Tuna Salad

1 cup green flageolet beans, picked over and rinsed
1 can tuna in olive oil
1 tsp dijon mustard
1 Tbsp white wine vinegar
1 cup chopped flat leaf parsley
a pinch of lemon zest
salt and pepper to taste


1. Cook the beans in approximately 4 cups of lightly salted water over low heat until they are tender, about 1 or 1 1/2 hours. If you like, add in the rind of a lemon or a bay leaf to the bean pot as they simmer. Make sure the beans stay submerged in liquid while they cook, but once they have softened, you can cook down the remaining liquid, or drain the beans and reserve the broth for a soup.


2. In the container you will use to transport your bean salad, mix together the mustard and vinegar. Open the can of tuna and mix the olive oil from the can into your vinaigrette. If you are using tuna in water, add a couple of tablespoons of olive oil to your bowl, and drain off the water from the tuna. Now add the tuna to the bowl, flake with a fork, and mix into the vinaigrette, leaving some chunks. Then mix in the beans (about 2 1/2 cups when cooked), the chopped parsley, and lemon zest. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Enjoy with some fresh bread.

Other recipes for heirloom beans:

Creamy green flageolet beans

Dutch bullet bean soup with Indian spices

Arikara beans with tomatillo pork

Ireland Creek Annie Baked Beans

Flageolet bean salad with fennel, orange, and tapenade

Arikara beans with roasted fennel and peppers

Jacob's Cattle bean and ham stew

Calypso beans with ginger and black mustard seeds

Ireland Creek Annie bean bruschetta

Lemon and herb Dutch bullet beans

Minty green flageolet beans

Dutch bullet beans and roasted squash soup

Rio Zape beans with toasted chile sauce

Arikara bean gratin

Calypso bean and leek soup