I’ve only ever had tuna packed in water. I never actually bought tuna before, so when I did go to the grocery store for some the other day, I was presented with a choice I never even knew I had–packed in water vs packed in oil.
I just use tuna to make tuna salad for sandwiches. What is packed-in-oil tuna used for?
-FrL-
Oops… is this a GQ post?
-FrL-
Oil-packed tuna can be used in sandwiches too. Water packed just has fewer calories. There’s more tuna choices, too…solid, chunk, flaked, white, light, etc.
I’ll have to try the oil-packed stuff in a sandwich sometime. Fat is yum.
-FrL-
That’s my take… growing up I only ever had tuna in oil - 99% of which was consumed in sandwiches.
I find it to be more flavorful than the watered stuff.
Water seems to wash away some of the flavor or somthing.
Fat does add flavor, of course, but also fat. If you’re watching calories beware of it.
And be sure to drain off all the oil carefully. It’ll soak right through the bread.
I tried the in oil stuff once all I can say is GAKK!
but then again I am one of those freaks who doesnt like fatty foods much.
Same here. I never saw tuna packed in water until the '80s.
I find chunk-light tuna to be more flavourful than chunk-white, whether it’s in water or oil.
I grew up with tuna packed in water, because my mom liked that it was fewer calories and lower in fat.
Somewhat recently, I moved to a low-carb diet. I still bought the stuff in water (it’s still low-carb) out of habit. Then, I bought a can in oil by accident. Eh, I decided to try it and was amazed to learn that the secret of a really good tuna salad sandwich is to make it with the stuff in the oil. It’s about a million times tastier. All those years I wondered why my tuna salad was never quite as good as the tuna salad at the deli counter … well, it was the oil.
I can go either way, comfortably. Apparently, I’m piscexual.
I prefer the water-packed myself. Be sure to heed Exapno Mapcase’s warning, though - it’s really, really greasy, and the oil gets on everything. I bought some by mistake, got extremely grossed out by the slickness, and offered it to the cat. She refused it, too. :eek:
I grew up on tuna in oil, and you can’t find it any more around here. I do prefer tuna in water, though.
As far as the greasiness, you drain off the oil and use less mayo.
When I worked in a deli, we used water packed tuna…but we used the white albacore kind. Also, we would make the tuna salad at least a day before it was used, not because we thought it improved with age but because we had to have a steady supply of all our salads, we didn’t want to run out. In any case, making tuna salad (or any salad with a mayo base) ahead of time will give the flavors a chance to blend.
If you look hard you can find tuna packed in olive oil. It’s about 10 times tastier than the vegetable oil kind, which make it around a million times tastier than that nasty dry water packed stuff. I think “Chicken of the Sea” packs it, but I’m 4500 miles from my pantry right now, and can’t check.
Awesome. Just awesome. 
I also like them both. However lately I can’t stand tuna sandwiches, since, being on a fat-restricted diet, I have to use fat free mayo. And that, friends, is a sin. Blech. I’ve actually grown accustomed to eating the stuff plain. It’s not too bad! All these years and I didn’t realise the stuff didn’t taste like mayo on bread. Neat.
Yep, when I was growing up, oil-packed was all there was. Then water-packed became all the rage, and of course, it was more expensive than oil-packed. I started noticing oil-packed back on the grocery store shelves a few years ago, and then that was more expensive! Nowadays, they seem to be about equal in cost.
I have tried the new canola oil-packed, but it didn’t seem to be as tasty as what I grew up with (I’m probably just getting too old!). I’m gonna look for the olive oil-packed and give that a try!