Simple, easy and tasty: this tuna and olive pasta is the perfect fast food.

This tuna and olive pasta recipe is the perfect example of the simplicity of Italian cooking. When you have little to no time, just choose a couple of ingredients you like and in a few minutes you will get a wonderful dish, light easy and fresh, perfect for the summer.

In Italy many people, especially when summer comes, are used to prepare cold pasta or pasta salad. This recipe is a mix between a classic warm dish and a pasta salad. This is perfect for meal prep or to reduce food waste, in fact you can make it and eat it hot, then store in the fridge what’s left and put it in the lunchbox the next day or enjoy it cold for a quick mid-week summer dinner.

You will soon discover that, as far as you can cook a perfect al dente pasta, you can cook any italian dish. It’s not unusual in fact, that every family has is own classic recipe. You just have to choose the ingredients for the sauce and it’s done.

Tuna and olives pasta: Healthy tip

If you don’t like whole wheat pasta, you can always boost the fiber of your white pasta by cooking it, cooling it down and then reheat it, this process increase the fiber content up to 30%. When pasta is cooled down it the carbohydrates are turn into resistant starches.

Resistant starches are basically fibers that will help feed the good bacteria in your intestines.

Main ingredients, swap and tips

• Tuna:  I usually buy only skipjack tuna. Since bigger fish inevitably eats more fish, the risk of getting more mercury is higher. Skipjack contains at least half the amount of mercury of larger species like Albacore or Yellowfin. If you do not worry too much about the mercury, feel free to use whatever you prefer. You can actually substitute tuna with mackerel. The dish will be definitely tastier and with a more distinct flavor.
• Olives: I prefer green olives for this recipe, the black one has a stronger taste that basically covers all the rest. However you can use what you have on hand, kalamata, green, Italian, roasted, salted olives are all great.
• Oil: if you buy high quality tuna in oil, you can safely use that oil in the can in the recipe. More often though, I find vegetable oils that I do not like. In this case you can remove the oil (do not flush it down the drain! absorb it with a paper towel and throw it in the compost bin instead).

Ingredients to make tuna and olive pasta

• 350gr of pasta
• 1 small green onion
• 1 small garlic clove, crushed
• 1 big can of tuna
• 100gr of pitted olives
• 2 tbs olive oil (only if you use natural canned tuna rather than in oil tuna)
• salt and pepper to taste

Method

Step 1
Bring the water to a boil, and cook the pasta (see how to cook spaghetti and other italian pasta) 

Step 2
Drain the tuna and cut the olive into pieces.

Step 3
In a large pan add the oil and the crushed garlic and the finely chopped onion. Let it cook for a couple of minutes then add the tuna and the olives. Let it cook for other 3 minutes, just to mix all the flavors, and then turn the heat off.

Step 4
Drain the pasta, and remember to set aside a cup of the cooking water. Turn the heat on again under the pan and pour the pasta into it. Stir fry the pasta for a couple of minutes, and toss until it’s evenly coated with the condiments. Add pepper to taste and serve.

Variations and suggestions
You can serve this dish either cold or warm. If you choose the cold version you should use short types of pasta such as penne, rigatoni or farfalle. If you prefer the warm one, you can also use linguine or spaghetti.

If you like, you can add few fresh tomatoes to the sauce. Chop them into 1cm pieces and add them a couple of minutes after the tuna and the olives.

You can pair this dish with a light white wine such as chardonnay.