Tuna Salad with Pasta: The Waterfront

Tuna salad can often be watery and tasteless or pasty and bitter. But never fear! My family recipe for tuna salad always comes out at the right consistency and tastes great!

My younger brother likes to eat this salad as a sandwich.  I like to eat it on top of pasta.

Since tuna salad is a fish dish, I thought "I Cover the Waterfront" sung by Billie Holiday would be a great fit!  The song expresses the longing of a woman waiting for her sailor boyfriend to come back home!

TUNA SALAD WITH PASTA

¾ cup Hellmann's® low fat mayonnaise

¼ cup half and half

¼- ½ cup sweet relish, according to taste

¼ teaspoon French's® Dijon Honey Mustard

6 cans white tuna in water, drained

½ cup chopped onion

1 cup thinly sliced celery

Zest from 1 lemon

½ teaspoon dill weed

¼ teaspoon cracked black pepper

1 can pineapple slices, drained

1 large tomato, thinly sliced

8 ounces Barilla® Pipette Pasta, cooked al dente, drained

2 tablespoons fresh Parmesan cheese, grated (optional garnish)

1. Put mayonnaise, half-and-half, relish, and mustard in a large bowl.  Stir together.  
2. Add drained tuna, onion, celery, lemon zest, dill weed, and black pepper.  
3. Cook pasta.  Cool slightly by letting stand at room temperature.  Do not rinse.  
4. Put pasta in a bowl, top with tuna salad.  Put a half a slice of pineapple, tomato slice, and half a lemon slice at the side of the bowl.  
5. Garnish with Parmesan cheese, if desired.