I was wandering through the fish section of my local Stew Leonard's, lamenting the high price of fish even in a store with good prices... when I saw a sign announcing tuna steaks "frozen at sea..."
They looked good, and I love tuna, and the price was too good to pass up! So I bought a small steak, took it home and put it in a bowl with microplaned garlic and ginger, soy sauce, sherry, and some of my reclaimed (from a jar of peanut butter) peanut oil. This all sat in the fridge for about three hours, getting turned every now and then, while I tried to think up an interesting accompaniment...
Lightning struck!
I tossed half a head of my treasure trove of also-on-sale cauliflower into the food processor and pulsed it until I had fairly uniform rice-sized pieces. In a large skillet, I sautéed the cauliflower with a bit of ginger, garlic, peanut oil, and smoked salt until it was just starting to brown a bit and cooked enough for my taste (about 5 minutes).
While this was cooking, I heated a grill pan, added a bit of peanut oil and placed the marinated tuna steak in the pan on an angle (everybody loves those angled grill marks!). This cooked for about 2-3 minutes per side. While this was grillin', I added about 3/4 cup of chicken stock to the marinade and boiled it down to make a simple sauce.
I turned the heat back on for a moment under the cauliflower, added a splash of toasted sesame oil...
And made two beds of cauliflower on our two plates.
I cut the steak in half and tucked each half into its own bed, poured a bit of the sauce on top, and sprinkled minced scallions over all...
We sat down to a dinner that offered a surprise in every bite! The cauliflower was completely unexpected and the "frozen at sea" tuna was worth every penny, and... speaking of pennies... each plate contained less than $2 worth of tuna... We did not, for one moment, feel the need for more.
Portion size, people!!!