Tuna Noodle Casserole

Hi,

Tuna noodle casserole was never on my list of things to try. I knew of it. My friend Penelope Bingham has researched it for a presentation, "Whatever happened to Tuna Noodle Casserole?" I've always considered it an iconic back-of-the-box/can recipe, which likely originated in the 1950's.

In the last week, I had more conversations related to tuna noodle casserole than I ever had in my whole life combined. Some people love it. Others hate it. For many more, it was a well known dish they had never tasted. I fell into the category of knowing about and never having tried.

Yesterday, I decided tuna noodle casserole would be a fun lunch. I already had egg noodles (kluski type), a can of tuna and Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup. I needed an additional can of tuna. Two people I mentioned tuna noodle casserole, both referred to potato chips sprinkled on top while their hands imitated a sprinkling gesture. I bought the potato chips to give it whirl.

This would have been a quicker dish to assemble, if I used regular egg noodles. Kluski noodles are brought to a boil, then simmered 20-25 minutes until desired tenderness. Meanwhile in a bowl, I emptied the mushroom soup, added 1/2 cup milk, one cup peas and drained tuna. Once the noodles were tender, they were folded into the tuna and sauce.

Potato chips are layered between the tuna-noodle mixture: bottom, middle and top, then baked for 25 minutes at 400 degrees Fahrenheit.



We couldn't discern the potato chip texture in the casserole, only those on top. If made again, I would only sprinkle potato chips on top only.

For my family, this was our first exposure to Tuna Noodle Casserole. We quite enjoyed this iconic meal of the 1950's.

I learned there was a widower who made tuna noodle casserole every Sunday. He dined on it every evening. If he had a social engagement for dinner, the daily portion of tuna noodle casserole became his breakfast or lunch. It was estimated he maintained this tuna noodle casserole ritual for ten years.

Tuna noodle casserole is the stuff urban legends are made of.

Regards,

We had tuna noodle casserole EVERY FRIDAY in Lent and many other Friday when I was young. It really communicated the concept of sacrifice and abstinance from meat.

And it is one thing that my wife made for dinner exactly ONCE.

jlawrence01 wrote:We had tuna noodle casserole EVERY FRIDAY in Lent and many other Friday when I was young. It really communicated the concept of sacrifice and abstinance from meat.

And it is one thing that my wife made for dinner exactly ONCE.

Count me a fan of tuna noodle casserole, but I don't know if I'd want it with the cream of mushroom soup these days. But some noodles, canned tuna, and canned peas? Hell yeah! I'll take the crushed potato chips too.

seemingly tuna casserole was on our 10 day meal rotation that our live in babysitter made as a kid.

No noodles, and served over toast. got sick of it because it was a regular item, but i could see having some in the near future. I agree with kenny though, no cream of mushroom soup, but a basic scratch cream sauce(probably like I do for ham and scalloped potatoes.

I didn't have tuna noodle casserole until my late 20s, but it's now one of my go-to comfort dishes. No ham, lots of peas, definitely potato chips next time.

Tuna Noodle is a wintertime staple in my house. I use cream of mushroom soup, but I also add a beaten egg to the mixture. I used to use potato chips, but long ago switched to Durkee's (French's) Fried Onions, which I mix into the casserole as well as put on top along with some grated cheese. Usually, I go easy on the noodles, too. I just made this last week for the first time this winter. MMMMM, pure Winter comfort.

About once every year or so, I make a tuna noodle casserole. I generally use an elbow noodle and make my own sauce, add peas and then top with fine shredded cheddar cheese.

I enjoy it a couple of times each winter. I add a tsp lemon juice, mushrooms, and use small shell pasta. I have experimented with different kinds of pastas and find that small shells seem to work the best.

stevez wrote:Tuna Noodle is a wintertime staple in my house. I use cream of mushroom soup, but I also add a beaten egg to the mixture. I used to use potato chips, but long ago switched to Durkee's (French's) Fried Onions, which I mix onto the casserole as well as put on top along with some grated cheese. Usually, I go easy on the noodles, too. I just made this last week for the first time this winter. MMMMM, pure Winter comfort.

I thought Durkee's Fried Onions would be a great addition, which I am glad you affirmed. I wanted to try it once as-is before playing with it.

Also if you put those remaining onions on toward the end, you can stir the tuna casserole one more time. I didn't this time to retain whatever effect the potato chip layers may have.

Tuna noodle casserole can easily join our roster of winter food eaten a few times a year.

Regards,

I think I may actually have to try this one. I made it once, and it was not a big hit at my house. Maybe another attempt is in order.

My Mom made the best tuna noodle casserole. She made her own white sauce-a kind of béchamel with egg noodles and frozen peas. Jays potato chips were crushed and only put on the top. As I remember was pretty good and now I really want some! I'll have to ask her for the recipe.

"Tunafish and noodles", that's what we called it in my house growing up. It was a regular Friday item, along with Mac 'n Cheese, fish sticks, the odd omlette, and every once in a while, a real fish. Oh, and canned salmon croquettes, those too.

Mom used the basic Campbell's version, but frequently added a bit of cream and egg to the soup. Lots of paprika, and, if we'd been good, Durkee's onions on the top. I loved it.

It occurred to me years ago that it, like mac 'n cheese, might be Americanized versions of some originally Italian dish, compromised in an immigrant community over here, using what was available and affordable. I'd bet the Antonius would have something to say about that possibility.

Geo

Cathy2 wrote:Also if you put those remaining onions on toward the end, you can stir the tuna casserole one more time. I didn't this time to retain whatever effect the potato chip layers may have.

I would recommend against stirring a second time. That might lead to a dried out casserole. Instead, try adding a beaten egg to the mixture before baking. That adds a little bit of extra body that I really enjoy. Also, a hit (or more) of cayenne in the mix really livens up this otherwise pretty whitebread dish.

The stouffer's tnc (red box) ain't bad for a hot, quick lunch on the jobsite.

I grew up on regular tuna casserole dinners, but I've always hated mushrooms and I used to pick out the teensy little shroom pieces from the soup. Now my husband refuses to eat tuna that is hot (no tuna melts either!) so I usually use canned salmon, or leftover salmon if I have. I sort of use the Joy of Cooking recipe for the sauce but add whatever else is around and feels right.

I may be getting up from this chair and making it for dinner tonight. Now. Thanks Cathy!

When I was in the hospital last year, tuna noodle casserole was one of the things I begged my mom to make me. It did NOT disappoint! I fondly recall it from our childhood dinner repertoire, but my family has always had it with cream of celery soup instead of mushroom and crackers crumbled on top. I don't think I would enjoy it any other way - it is its own special thing, with a place in my heart shielded from rationality.

i grew up on (and am a fan of) the old school version, with campbell's CoM and durkee's. but i always like a radical twist or gourmet-ish version on a classic . . . if it works. anyone have such a recipe to share?

Cathy2, hard to believe your family got through a lifetime of Lenten seasons without tuna casserole. No one's yet mentioned another aspect of its one-time popularity, particularly for the family on a tight budget - it's entirely a pantry dish, if you forgo the milk or use canned evaporated milk.

Hi Cathy2,
I think Tuna Noodle casserole is something so many of us feel strongly about because it was part of a faith tradition. If you say "tuna noodle casserole" to anyone raised Catholic, it's probably going to stir many memories of meatless Fridays.

In addition to that casserole, we hald salmon loaf (which I have never wanted to re-create!) and an odd concoction that started with uncooked Minute Rice, topped with a few cans of tuna, cream of cheddar cheese soup, canned tomatoes and a sprinkling of dried basil. Did anyone else ever try this bubbly casserole? Just curious.

When I was little, the focus on Lent was fasting, however this broadened as I grew older to include good works. I'm not a big meat person, so giving it up as a sacrifice was lost on me.

Mention "Lent and tuna casseroles" and you are going to hear a lot of stories.

I can hardly believe this myself, but this discussion is making me want to make a tuna noodle casserole - the first time in 30 years I've had the urge to do so.

I'm with you Katie.

I think I can hold out until Lent, though.

Tnx for the memories foo d —I'd forgotten about the Durkee's! My mom used to use it in lots of places, including tunafish and noodles [did anyone else's family call it that?], and to this day, I keep a bottle of it in my 'fridge, just to add a bit here 'n there.

Speaking of lenten meals, when we moved to Sacramento in the mid-50s, my mom discovered something called tamale pie, using corn meal and black olives [talk about *exotic* to a kid from the Front Range!], and ground beef, lots of cheese, tomatoes, etc. For lent, she just left out the meat and put in more cheese. Worked fine. Tried it once with tuna, it was pretty awful.

Geo

Hi,

My parents went to Catholic schools, but their kids went to Saturday morning CCD class. My Dad now regrets not sending us to Catholic schools, because his children are culturally Catholic and not real Catholic. I have been informed by real Catholics, I am considered Catholic-lite.

We never ate meat on Fridays until the rule change. We were fish sticks or fish cakes and mac and cheese. The closest I ever came to anything like Tuna Noodle Casserole was creamed tuna on toast. This was so rarely made, it was considered a treat.

Katie, you mentioned milk. My family went through at least five gallons of whole milk a week when we were kids. My Mom experimented with dried milk on an economy kick, which didn't get beyond one batch. We did have a case of evaporated milk in the basement in case of emergency. I never saw one can used. I never saw it again after our last move. I guess it was given away or tossed.

I don't remember much abstinence about Lent. I never heard my parents pledge to give up a thing nor did they do any good works during this period.

I do get a good laugh at St. Patrick's Day functions at the Irish American Heritage Center. They always announce a special dispensation to allow people to indulge instead of sticking to their Lenten abstinence. While for me, it means I can have a Coke, I usually continue to abstain. It was too hard to give up initially, I don't want to revisit that issue until Easter.

As for Durkee's, I have a bottle in my refrigerator. It took quite a while to find it and now that I tasted it, I am happy to pass it on to the next eager beaver. I have no memories associated with it, so it does very little for me.

Regards,

Geo wrote:It occurred to me years ago that it, like mac 'n cheese, might be Americanized versions of some originally Italian dish, compromised in an immigrant community over here, using what was available and affordable. I'd bet the Antonius would have something to say about that possibility.

Geo

Geo -

That's a very reasonable idea but I rather suspect this dish is in some sense at least an American invention, born in the 20th century, perhaps even in the post-war wave of 'modern', industrial cuisine. Campbell's played a large and active rôle in the spread of what I'll call here "quick food," which offered the harried housewife a chance to spend more time doing whatever it was she was supposed to be doing rather than cooking, according to the societal norms of the time. As Katie said just above, TNC is one of those quintessential pantry dishes and, what's more, one that uses not just preserved items but also processed items, in the form of the soup and the crunchy garnish, be it potato chips or crisped onions. Less time cooking, less time shopping, which could be done once a week or so.

In my family, where Italian foodways reigned supreme, we ate a good amount of canned tuna and I have always loved both white and red versions of pasta -- typically spaghetti -- with canned tuna, but those dishes involve things that were strange or even repulsive to many Americans back in the day: garlic, anchovies, capers, peperoncini... And from the other direction, TNC was something quite foreign to me - I've had it just a couple of times in my life, when invited to someone's house for dinner, I think once as a child and once later on, on a cold and rainy Friday evening in the spring in 1983... I remember the experience vivedly and not fondly... *

I know of some dishes from various European cuisines that vaguely resemble TNC but not enough to strike me as being forerunners thereof in any direct sense. And the Italian combinations of spaghetti (or other forms of pasta) with tinned tuna are all sufficiently different that at most, it seems to me, one could say that the Italian influence here may have just been in the sense that they helped popularise noodle based meals in this country among ethnic groups who were not especially noodle-oriented to start with. The use of a dairy product with fish is not necessarily un-Italian at all but it renders a dish not appropriate for fast days according to the old way of doing things, so a dish such as this is more in line with northern European fasting traditions than those of Italians. Not especially consequential now but more so as one goes back in time.

Be that all as it may, I really suspect this dish was more a product of the corporate mind than that of the popular culinary genius of the American people... But perhaps there are some old recipes out there from before the age of industrial cuisine that would make me want to revise that and say that it was a 'folkish' dish perhaps just popularised by corporate leadership, as it were...

Antonius

* Not to say that I think the dish is necessarily bad -- it's hard for me to say what I really think of it, since my experience of it is so limited... but that version I was served in 1983 was not especially enticing to my palate...

One of the things that really stood out for me in the famous Beirut episode of No Reservations was Anthony Bourdain's reaction to tuna noodle casserole on the rescuing Navy ship. In an online interview, he wrote "There are times in one's life when tuna noodle casserole and macaroni and cheese speak directly to the heart."

I've never eaten it. I sometimes make a dish with canned salmon and a bechamel that I suppose is similar enough, but it isn't baked. My parents never stopped going meatless on Fridays, but have replaced the cardboard fish sticks I grew up with with an occasional salmon steak - I imagine that a rich casserole didn't seem enough like deprivation to them.

janeyb wrote:I think Tuna Noodle casserole is something so many of us feel strongly about because it was part of a faith tradition. If you say "tuna noodle casserole" to anyone raised Catholic, it's probably going to stir many memories of meatless Fridays.

Is this also of a particular generation? I ask only because I was raised Catholic, went to Catholic schools, my mom still maintains no meat on Fridays during Lent, and I didn't have tuna casserole for the first time until maybe when I was 27 (?), in a completely secular context (not Lenten season).

My family went through at least five gallons of whole milk a week when we were kids.

I remember a stretch of years when our household of nine routinely went through two gallons of milk a DAY. My mother was also constantly making iced tea and kool-aid to keep up with the demand for fluids. Someone was always being sent to the store to buy more milk. I don't remember getting many chances to drink milk though - two of my older brothers hogged most of it, and we younger ones were afraid of the wrath we'd incur from them if we drank the last of the milk. I consider it one of the privileges of adulthood to be able to drink as much milk as I want.

Tony,

As much as I enjoy TNC on a cold winter's night, I have no illusions of it being any kind of a folk dish. The idea of this dish is, as you suspect, right off the back of a soup can or torn from the pages of a 50's Ladies' magazine. Nevertheless it's a guilty pleasure, though I don't feel at all guilty about liking it in the way that one would feel about liking, for example, Hostess Twinkies or Chef Boy-Ar-Dee.

Another item that seems to have somehow changed over the years is the canned tuna itself. The cans used to contain 7 oz, then 6.5 oz, and now 6 oz. But the size of the can is still the same, so you need to buy more for the same recipes that you used to make. Then there's the quality. I used to like chunk tuna, then it started tasting nasty to me so I bought solid (albacore). Now the albacore is starting to suck and I have to find Tonno, etc., to get a good tasting tuna. What the hell is going on here? Are they selling all the good tuna to Japan now and just canning the lower quality stuff for us?

Cogito wrote:Another item that seems to have somehow changed over the years is the canned tuna itself. The cans used to contain 7 oz, then 6.5 oz, and now 6 oz. But the size of the can is still the same, so you need to buy more for the same recipes that you used to make. Then there's the quality. I used to like chunk tuna, then it started tasting nasty to me so I bought solid (albacore). Now the albacore is starting to suck and I have to find Tonno, etc., to get a good tasting tuna. What the hell is going on here? Are they selling all the good tuna to Japan now and just canning the lower quality stuff for us?

When I went to the store to buy a second can of tuna, I was surprised how many cans were five ounces. The recipe calls for two six-ounce cans of tuna. I ended up buying a 12-ounce can to satisfy the recipe requirements.

Regards,