Canned tuna sparked with lemon and capers creates a superb sauce that complements many pasta shapes — penne, shells, or linguine, to name only a few. I prefer solid-pack tuna in olive oil for the best flavor and texture. I sometimes add a small handful of unpitted black olives — Kalamata or Gaeta — and a large, ripe tomato, seeded and diced, for a delicious variation. Italians would never serve cheese with fish, but you have my permission to break the rules!
Ingredients
Serves 2 to 4
Step 1
Place tuna in pasta serving bowl and break it into large bite-size pieces. Add garlic, lemon zest, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, and capers and stir gently to combine. Set aside to warm to room temperature, or preferably, place the bowl (be sure it's heatproof) over the pasta pot to warm the ingredients while heating the water. Once the water comes to a boil, remove bowl and set aside.
Step 2
Cook pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until al dente. Drain pasta well and immediately add to sauce in bowl. Sprinkle with parsley and toss. Serve at once with Parmesan cheese. Pass the pepper mill.
Step 3
Recommended pasta: 8 ounces penne rigate, medium shells (conchiglie rigate), rigatoni, or linguine.
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Reviews (103)
Back to TopToday I made 4X the recipe, adding large diced kalamata olives and artichoke hearts for the Super Bowl. Yum! Yum! I’ve made it many times with only the original recipe and it always so wonderful!
eldereno
Fredericksburg, Va
2/14/2022
Awesome. Made it as written including warming the sauce over the water as it comes to a boil. I have a nice large pasta serving dish that was perfect for this. Really if you make this the first time, use a quality canned tuna and a really good olive oil. And leave out the the additions . While many sound good, the simplicity and freshness of this dish makes a wonderfully different and tasty dish. This is a keeper .
jimpan
Connecticut
5/14/2019
What a pleasant surprise! Being out of capers, I decided to add spinach; it worked quite nicely. Also, I used brown rice pasta and an extra amount of cheese. BRAVO!
cha93pet3766
Pittsburgh, PA
3/13/2019
This was amazing! I doubled it the second time. I used zest from one orange because I only had one lemon and it was amazing. Me and my husband agree that it's a lot better without parmesan. :D Thank you for posting! <3
AlinaFM
Sibiu, Romania
1/10/2018
I have made this recipe for years. In cool weather, I serve it warm. In the summer, I like to serve it cold. If served cold, it needs to be seasoned a bit more, but is amazing. One of my favorites from Epicurious.
Anonymous
Kansas City, Missouri
7/15/2017
I love this recipe exactly as is and have made it several times. I have to say the BEST time I made this recipe I used high quality tuna in oil and meyer lemons. I think the meyer lemons really made a difference.
darcois
Chicago, IL
11/24/2015
I went along with heating the tuna with onions, added olives and cherry tomatoes and oregano, heat all and add the lemon juice and zest at the very end. Wonderful!
McElwee
Philadelphia
3/23/2015
喜欢这道菜。非常可口的虽然ingredients are minimal. I used good quality tuna and the lemon sauce made it so that it was not fishy tasting in the least. Didn't really need the parmesan cheese but I added and it tasted great. Will try adding sliced black olives next time. Definitely a keeper for my house.
michmckn
Portland, OR
3/2/2015
I love tuna but was skeptical about this recipe. The ingredients sounded so light that I thought the recipe would turn out too bland for my tastes. Was I wrong! This dish has it all--totally delicious, easy peasy to make, affordable, and healthy. I'll be adding this to our regular rotation. I pan fried the tuna in its olive oil, along with some chopped onions and garlic, as other reviewers suggested, but I honestly don't know that that made any noticeable difference. Maybe I didn't fry it long enough. I used regular capers since that's what we had (Trader Joe's brand in a vinegar brine). I omitted the parsley and cheese since we didn't have any. And I only used 4oz of tuna (our last can). I served over microwave-steamed zucchini noodles (also works over pasta) and garnished with a sliced hard boiled egg. I was afraid that adding plain noodles would make the dish even more bland, but no, the tuna mix paired perfectly with the noodles. The 4oz can of tuna, 2 hard-boiled eggs over 3 small zucchinis provided a perfectly sensible but filling portion for 2 people. Can't wait to make this again and impress the rest of my family with it!
FooFoodMonster
Bay Area, CA
11/9/2014
try toasting the tuna in its oil in a frying pan with onion and then follow the recipe! even more amazing
Elisasol
Miami, Florida (trick learned at Forte dei Marmi)
8/7/2014
Tuna--who knew? To add a bit of moisture, I cooked down about 1c of canned tomatoes. They blended right in. Great "what's in the pantry" meal.
kootenaygirl
3/1/2014
This gets four stars because 1. it's delicious, 2. requires no actual cooking, 3. can be assembled in the time it takes to boil water, and 4. uses ingredients you probably have already. I think it's best with mezzi rigatoni. The big hollows are like a scooper for the sauce.
cheesepuff
Brooklyn, NY
9/25/2013
Finally got around to making this...WOW, so easy and so good, Added the pitted kalamata olives and the diced seeded tomatoes and used yellow fin tuna in oil. The lemon gave it such a bright flavor. Just loved it. This is the kind of recipe that will be easy to play with, adding different ingredients
greygrey
Southfield MI
8/14/2013
easy, fast and fresh. i only had fresh basil and that worked perfectly. love this sauce.
hollandhester
CT
8/3/2013
Amazingly easy and delicious recipe that would be perfect for making in a pinch. The only changes I made were browning the garlic in olive oil (three cloves, not one), not draining the tuna, and adding a pinch of red pepper flakes. The flavors were bold and fresh, and the dish looked beautiful with bow-tie pasta. Love this recipe--I will be making it again and again!
cookbook03
Seattle, WA
6/13/2013
