Dong Won Hot Tuna

My husband and I made a repeat visit to the "Korea town" area of Shinjuku in Tokyo last week and dropped in on a supermarket this time. My husband picked up several snacks, and I couldn't resist this tuna because of the name. I'm sure that it's all pretty tame stuff in Korean, perhaps the equivalent of "Trader Joe" there. To me though, I had to titter at the connotations. Besides, even without the awesome name, I would have considered sampling this since I do like tuna and spicy food. 

Based on the picture on the can, I expected this to be bits of tuna with little hot peppers sprinkled among it. My first surprise was that when I popped the seal and tried to "drain" the tuna, a red fluid ran out. After removing the top, I caught a whiff of that "dog food" type of smell that you sometimes get from canned meat products, even when they are for human consumption.

Looking inside, I could see something that resembled hash more than canned tuna. At this point, I was experiencing some pretty serious buyer's remorse. I wasn't sure it looked like something I'd want to put in my mouth, but I'd already forked over my 240 yen ($2.82) so I decided that I was going to, at the very least, get a review out of it.

It really doesn't look much better in a sandwich, except to the extent that you can see less of it this way.

Tentatively, I dipped my fork into it and speared what looked to be a tiny cube of white potato and gave it a sample. It tasted slightly spicy and modestly flavored with tuna. Actually, it tastes pretty good. Heartened by the sampling, I pondered exactly how I was going to eat it now that it wasn't what I thought it was. I was thinking I'd make some sort of spicy tuna salad by mixing it with mayo, but this isn't that sort of thing. There is a lot of sauce in it so it's not like dry, flaked fish. In fact, this appears to be a salad that is pre-made and canned so I just slathered half of it on a cheese croissant roll I had in the freezer and chowed down.

The tuna flavor is very present, but tamed by the spicy flavors of the red chili sauce and diluted by what look like carrot, onion and potato pieces. You can't really taste the vegetables though because they are very tender and well-cooked as well as well-marinated in the chili sauce. The sauce is only mildly hot and spicy, and slightly sweet. Keep in mind that there was no Japanese translation over the ingredients and I can't read Korean at all so I can't determine anything about the ingredients. That's actually a little refreshing for me since I can just rely on my senses rather than having to do research.

This was surprisingly good right out of the can and didn't betray much of the "canned food" taste that some of these sorts of foods have. I'm guessing that has to do with the tuna and chili sauce having strong flavor profiles. At 190 calories for the whole can (and one can offering two servings for the likes of me), this was a surprisingly tasty and low calorie lunch option. The only problems with it are that it's slightly expensive and  that I can only buy it at Korean supermarkets and they aren't exactly frequently dotting the landscape. That being said, I'd definitely pick up a can if I was in the area. It's a nice novel taste experience and a tasty quick meal.