Make-over your mama’s tuna with Healthy Tuna Salad from Bari Healthy Life. It’s so creamy, dreamy, and delicious you won’t even know it’s good for you. It’s perfect for low carb lunch following bariatric, weight loss surgery. This high protein salad is virtually guaranteed (ALMOST) to show the scale who’s boss during the weeks you incorporate a scoop into your bariatric meal plans. Fluffy even calls it one of her secret WLS weapons!
Go Mayo-Free & Focus on Protein
- Replace high calorie, high fat mayonnaise with 2% Cottage Cheese. (We heart Daisy brand because it has so few ingredients!)
- Add a stealthy zero carb salad dressing for additional moisture. (Yes, we are one of “those” people who use Walden Farms zero calorie dressings strategically in recipes because the ingredients are kinda sorta innocuous and it extends a recipe without adding calories.)
- Add nonfat plain Greek yogurt for extra creaminess.
- Hit it with a punch of mustard. (WE have a love affair with Grey Poupon Country Dijon, a grainy, French-style mustard.)
- Add pizzazz with dill pickles, dill relish, or pickle juice. (Yes, we ARE pickle heads and love Vlasic Dill Relish best.)
Creamy Tuna Salad is Healthy!
It’s packed with protein. It’s also low fat, low carb, LOW IN CALORIES, and has a high satisfaction factor. And, there’s no added sugar to spike sugar cravings. It will keep you full and happy for hours.
Did It Help Fluffy Lose Weight?
We’re not making any nutritional claims here, but Fluffy made Healthy Tuna Salad so frequently during active weight loss mode, following RNY surgery. The recipe is so easy, takes about five minutes to make, and makes three servings of ½ cup each. She’d eat a serving per day and swore she had the best weight losses for the week, when incorporating the tuna salad into her lunches 3 out of 5 weekdays. Swearsies! (But remember, YMMV. Ha!)
Not Your Mama’s Tuna Salad
Do you remember the tuna salad from our lunch boxes? It wasn’t remotely healthy! As school kids, we remember taking tuna fish sandwiches almost every day. We loved them. Mom made her salad with about a 50/50 ratio of Hellmann’s Mayonnaise to tuna with a hefty shake of salt, pepper, and granulated garlic. It was completely, decadently, creamy, and unctuous! In fact, you might be forgiven for calling it a mayo sandwich on white bread!
Mom had clearly never heard of heart-destroying trans fats found in store-bought mayo. She wasn’t concerned with “light foods” or the “nutritional density” of a recipe. Nope. She just continually tried to find cheap, filling sources of protein for a growing family; and as a DFSW (Delicate Flower of Southern Womanhood—google it! It’s a thing…), she carried on a life-long love affair with Hellmann’s Mayonnaise. Dad never knew! But Mom knew a 50/50 split of mayo to tuna was also a great way to make the tuna stretch further, feeding more mouths. So that’s what we brought for school lunches.
What’s So Healthy About BHL’s Tuna Salad?
Tuna and Metal Disclaimer:
We don’t want to debate whether we should limit consumption of tuna due to mercury and heavy metal exposure. Please consider if tuna is safe for YOU to eat. We encourage you to ask your bariatric surgeon, RD/nutritionist, or PCP how much tuna is safe for you to consume each week. We’re all different and have unique risk factors for mercury and heavy metal exposure.
“The official recommendation for fish and seafood consumption from the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the American Heart Association is to eat fish at least twice weekly (at least 8oz total).”(1)
Today’s Dietician, March 2017
How Healthy Is BHL Tuna Salad?
Tuna
Tuna is a great source of heart healthy omega-3 fatty acids (EPA & DHA), selenium, B12, and has good levels of Vitamin D and iron. It’s protein dense, too. A 2.6 ounce pouch of Starkist Chunk Light Tuna in water only has 70 calories and delivers 17g of lean, dense, protein.(2) What a bargain!
ASMBS (American Society of Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery) Recommendations for Protein (3)
- 60-80 grams protein for women
- 80-100 grams protein for men
- Recommends bariatric recipes be low fat
- Recipes should contain 1 gram of protein/10 kcals energy (minimum)
BHL tries hard to develop bariatric recipes which satisfy the ASMBS recommended protein levels per calorie density. For 70cals of energy, you’d ideally want that protein to deliver at least 7g of dense protein. You can see Starkist Chunk Light Tuna in Water provides over 17 grams protein for only 70 kcals. That’s 200% as much protein from a single pouch! Most of us who follow a Bariatric Forever Diet can finish 1 pouch of tuna in a meal. It’s about ¼ cup by volume.
Are Cottage Cheese and Greek Yogurt Healthy?
Low fat cottage cheese supplies even more protein to the recipe along with a generous amount of phosphorous, calcium, riboflavin and B12.(4) Plus more importantly, it provides the texture of chopped egg while also adding a creamy mayonnaise component.
Non-fat plain Greek yogurt adds mayo creaminess as well while increasing the protein value and providing a nice source of calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, and B vitamins.(5)
The Incredible Edible Egg!
Yep. More protein! Eggs offer very important nutrients too, such as Vitamin D, zinc, calcium and the full complement of B vitamins, especially B12.(6) Additionally, eggs are very liver and brain friendly thanks to the choline present in yolks.
Can You Modify Healthy Tuna Salad to Fit into Bariatric Stage 3A and Stage 3B Diet Plans?
Because of the texture, this tuna salad would need to have a few mods and substitutions made in order to fit earlier stages of a post-op bariatric diet progression.
Bariatric Stage 3A, Puree Diet Stage Modification
Make the recipe in a food processor or blender. Then pulse the salad until it is well-mixed and reaches a smooth, mousse-like consistency. You might need to address its creaminess by adding more Greek yogurt or even adding a bit more Walden Farms Chipotle Ranch Dressing or pickle juice.
Bariatric Stage 3B, Mechanical Soft Diet
Make it Soft by subbing dill pickle juice for the relish or pickles called for in the recipe. Exchange the green onions for granulated onion or onion powder. Substitute the smooth Grey Poupon Dijon Mustard for the Country Style to remove mustard seeds. By making these substitutions, you would preserve the soft texture of the tuna and cottage cheese and be able to enjoy chewing again.
Serving Ideas for Bariatric Stage 4, Forever Diet
- Serve the ½ cup of BHL’s Healthy Tuna Salad on a bed of greens.
- Lettuce cups make a great wrap. (It’s a nutrient dense, low calorie meal that makes eating protein first, fun!)
- Slice radish or cucumber into “crackers.”
- Fill celery with the tuna mixture.
Craving More Crunch?
Check out this Crunchy Confetti Chopped Salad from Bari Healthy Life. It’s perfect with creamy tuna and will add texture and important nutrients into lunch.
Crunchy Confetti Chopped Salad (Make once, eat 2-3 times!)
Healthy Tuna Salad-Creamy Dreamy Yum!
Course: SaladCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Easy3
servings10
minutes11
minutes102
kcal1/2
cup21
minutesMake-over your mama’s tuna with healthy tuna salad from Bari Healthy Life. It’s so creamy, dreamy, and delicious you won’t even know it’s good for you. Perfect for lunches after bariatric, weight loss surgery! Recipe yields 1 1/2 cups.
Ingredients
2.6 ounce pouch Chunk Light Tuna in Water (70g)
2 ounces 2% cottage cheese (57g)
1 ounce nonfat Greek yogurt, plain (Fage) (28g)
2 large eggs
1-2 tablespoons Walden Farms Chipotle Ranch Dressing (15-30mL)
1/8-1/4 cups green onions, chopped (30g)
1 tablespoon dill relish (15g)
1 tablespoon country Dijon mustard (15g)
1/4 teaspoon granulated garlic
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Redmond’s Real Salt to taste
Directions for perfect boiled eggs
- Bring small saucepan of water to boil over high heat.
- When water is boiling, use a spoon to gently submerge eggs into water.
- Set a timer for 11 minutes and let eggs boil gently. You may need to adjust the temperature once the water returns to a boil.
- When timer expires, pour off water and run cold water over eggs until cool.
- Peel and coarsely chop hard boiled eggs.
- DIRECTIONS FOR HEALTHY TUNA SALAD
- While eggs are boiling, chop the green onions until finely chopped.
- Combine all other ingredients into a mixing bowl except cottage cheese, yogurt and Walden Farms Dressing.
- Add chopped eggs.
- Add cottage cheese and half the yogurt. Stir to combine. Adjust the looseness of the salad to your preference. If it looks too dry, add some of the Walden Farms Chipotle Dressing.
- Add yogurt and WF Dressing alternating until you get the consistency you love!
- Taste and adjust seasonings.
Notes
- When making Healthy Tuna Salad add the wet ingredients a little at a time. The amount of liquid left in your tuna, dill relish, cottage cheese, yogurt and dressing will vary from product to product and will affect the texture of the salad. So to avoid your salad being too wet, we found by adding and mixing everything with the cottage cheese first, then adding small amounts of the yogurt and WF dressing allowed more control over the final tuna salad consistency! Perfect tuna salad every time!
- MAKE IT BARIATRIC STAGE 3A PUREE: Make the recipe in a food processor or blender. Then pulse the salad until it is well-mixed and reaches a smooth, mousse-like consistency. You might need to address its creaminess by adding more Greek yogurt or even adding a bit more Walden Farms Chipotle Ranch Dressing or pickle juice.
- MAKE IT BARIATRIC STAGE 3B SOFT DIET: Make it Soft by subbing dill pickle juice for the relish or pickles called for in the recipe. Exchange the green onions for granulated onion or onion powder. Substitute the smooth Grey Poupon Dijon Mustard for the Country Style to remove mustard seeds. By making these substitutions, you would preserve the soft texture of the tuna and cottage cheese and be able to enjoy chewing again.
- NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION (per 1/2 cup serving): 102 calories; 13 g protein; 4 g fat; 2 g carbohydrates; 0 g fiber; 2 g net carbohydrates; 1 g sugar; 0 g added sugar
Nutrition Facts
3 servings per container
- Amount Per ServingCalories102
- % Daily Value *
- Total Fat
4g
7%
- Saturated Fat 1g 5%
- Trans Fat 0g
- Cholesterol 138mg 46%
- Sodium 470mg 20%
- Total Carbohydrate
2g
1%
- Dietary Fiber 0g 0%
- Sugars 1g
- Protein 13g 26%
- Vitamin A 5%
- Vitamin C 1%
- Calcium 5%
- Iron 5%
* The % Daily Value tells you how much a nutrient in a serving of food contributes to a daily diet. 2,000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.
Please let me know how your BHL Healthy Tuna Salad turns out in the comments (scroll to the very bottom for the comment area)!
We love hearing from you and appreciate your feedback! Be sure to rate the recipe as well, please?! Muah!
I couldn’t find any Walden Farms dressings nor any low calorie Chipotle ranch dressings in my grocery store so I went with a semi-low calorie Chipotle, which probably changed the flavor quite a bit. I thought the taste and consistency were odd at first but the more I ate it the more I liked it! Very happy with the protein to calorie ratio on this meal and it’s pretty quick and easy to make! I’d make it again for sure.
Thank you for your honest feedback. The cottage cheese does give it a different texture and when making salads like this, it’s always best to gauge how wet your particular ingredients are prior to adding in the ingredients. I amended the recipe instructions because of your experience. I’m remaking it today for my lunch and will post the amended recipe if necessary. Things that could make a difference to the wetness: how much liquid in your pickle relish, how much liquid in your cottage cheese and did you stir it prior to measuring, how well or if you drained your tuna, how wet your Greek yogurt is, how large your eggs are…I could go on. So I always add things to look and stir before adding the total volume in a recipe. Things that would change the flavor: the chipotle dressing. Walden Farms is pretty mild–and really just serves as a zero calorie mayonnaise replacer. I actually prefer using Walden Farms Amazin’ Mayo or Chipotle Mayo in the recipe but can’t get that locally. So I sub the Walden Farms Chipotle Ranch Dressing. Glad you ended up liking it! And so happy you tried it and commented! It’s an awesome source of protein, plus I love that if you need to eat it wetter (for earlier bariatric stages) then you can easily adapt it! (I’ll post my changes today with a new update pic!)
***Update 3.05.20: Hi Kacie, I really don’t know why your salad turned out like it did. I made this again per the recipe. (I usually weigh ingredients on a scale. So I’m adding the weights above for you.) It turned out really like the first salad. I will change the dressing to be 1-2, because I prefer using 2 tbsp and 3 might be a bit wet for anyone other than Stage 3 peeps. Here’s how it turned out:
I’m amazed at how much flavor this recipe has for so little calories. I couldn’t find the Walden Farms dressing so I left it out, and I added some Penzey’s Florida seasoning (black pepper, lemon peel, orange peel, garlic, and onion) which gave it a nice peppery kick. So good! Looking forward to having this for lunch with cucumbers this week.
Oh, yay! I’m so glad to hear you liked it! I love it with cucumber, radish, and red bell pepper dippers. I love it stuffed in celery too. You can order the Walden Farms products from Amazon. (I put the Amazon Affiliate link in the recipe.) But I also love Vitacost.com for Walden Farms products. They have free shipping over $49, I think? We love their customer service, packaging, quality, pricing, and delivery time so much that we’re looking at becoming a Vitacost Affiliate (if we ever get time to do it). Ha! Great work around with the Penzey’s spices. Love Penzey’s!!
Can’t wait for you to try our other recipes and so glad you’re here!