Tuna tartare bagel, fried shallots, green sauce
A fun twist on a bagel with cream cheese. Made for those that love a lox bagel with scallion cream cheese.
It’s a tuna tartare…on a bagel! Envisioned to be enjoyed for lunch with a boujie friend and a fun drink. A drizzle of truffle oil wouldn’t hurt here!
The green sauce is a cream cheese based sauce with LOTS of fresh herbs like scallions, parsley and cilantro. The key to the beautiful bright green color is to blend the herbs with liquid before adding in the cream cheese. This sauce is super fresh and herbaceous, it pairs perfectly with an everything bagel, since the bagel has all those onion and garlic flavors going on.
If you won’t be making an everything bagel to enjoy with this, and prefer a plain bagel, go ahead and add a couple of garlic cloves to the green sauce. Trust me!
My recipe for ‘everything but the bagel’ seasoning is here if you can’t locate it in a store near you.
Makes extra green sauce. Keep in the fridge and slather on sandwiches, add to scrambled eggs, enjoy on a bacon and egg bagel, use as a pasta sauce, you name it! Thin it out with a bit of olive oil and lemon juice and you have a salad dressing.
Ingredients:
Bagels:
6g instant dried yeast
6g fine cooking salt
20g white sugar
440g bread flour, sifted
300ml warm water
1 egg, whisked
‘everything but the bagel’ seasoning
Tuna (per bagel):
100g raw yellowfin tuna, sashimi grade
1 tsp neutral oil, such as grapeseed oil
Green sauce:
1 block of cream cheese, 225g
4 tbsp neutral oil, such as grapeseed oil, or you can use extra virgin olive oil
1 bunch of parsley, bottom of stems removed
1 bunch of cilantro, bottom of stems removed
6 spring onion stalks
1 lemon, juiced
big pinch of salt
add only if needed: 90 ml of water, or 6 tbsp, more if needed
Note: if you won’t be having this with an everything bagel and you prefer a plain bagel, toss in 2 cloves of garlic into the green sauce before blending.
Garnish:
‘everything but the bagel’ seasoning
handful of fried shallots, roughly chopped
optional: truffle oil to drizzle over top
Method:
To make the dough: combine yeast, sugar and half the total water (no need to be precise) and let it sit for a few minutes, then stir to completely dissolve the yeast and sugar into the water. Add sifted flour and salt to a large mixing bowl, mix to combine and create a well in the center. Pour the yeast mixture into the well, along with the rest of the water. Mix and stir to combine, until you have a dough that is soft to the touch yet holds together in a ball.
Knead the dough: lightly flour a countertop and knead the dough for 5 minutes, or until the flour has been completely worked in.
Rising the dough: grab a large mixing bowl and lightly grease with olive oil. Place the dough into the bowl then flip, so that both sides are coated in oil. Cover with plastic cling wrap and a tea towel and place in a warm spot in your house to rise for 1 hour, or until the dough has doubled in size.
Form the balls: After the dough has doubled in size, divide the dough into 8 even pieces on a floured countertop. Form each piece into a ball, by rolling the dough against the countertop under your palm and occasionally moving the ball towards you with your fingers, releasing pressure from your hand so that a ball forms.
Line a baking sheet with baking paper and preheat the oven to 220C/425F. Put on a large pot of water over high heat and bring to a boil while you follow the next step.
Shape the bagels: Poke a hole in the center of each dough ball using your thumb and your index finger. Stretch the hole to create a space as big as you like for your bagels. Shape your bagels and place them onto the lined baking sheet. Let them sit for 5 minutes.
Boil the bagels: Add a big pinch of salt to the boiling water. Once the water is boiling, carefully lower 1 bagel at a time, using a slotted spoon, or your hands, and boil for 90 seconds on the first side. Flip, and boil for 90 seconds on the second side. Remove using a slotted spoon and add back to the lined baking sheet. Repeat with all of the bagels, if you feel comfortable boiling more than 1 at a time, go for it!
Garnish the bagels: whisk an egg really well in a small bowl and brush the tops of each bagel lightly with the egg, using a pastry brush, or your hands if you don’t have one. Sprinkle everything but the bagel seasoning on top of the egg wash and they are ready to bake.
Bake the bagels: bake in the oven on the middle rack for 20 minutes, rotating the baking tray once during the halfway mark. After 20 minutes, turn off the oven, pick up the bagels using the corners of the baking paper and transfer them to cool over your stove, aka ditch the hot baking tray and just let them cool on top of the baking paper they were already on. Cool for 5-10 minutes, then dig in!
To make the green sauce: Remove cream cheese from the fridge. Prep herbs by washing, patting dry and removing the bottom quarter end of the stems. Some stems are ok! Add to a high speed blender with lemon juice, oil, salt and water. Leave out the cream cheese for now! Blend until completely smooth and bright green. Add more water (1 tbsp at a time) if you need to get it to blend more smoothly. Once the herbs are completely blended, add cream cheese and blend again until completely incorporated. You may need to scrape down the sides. Once smooth, add to a jar, or tupperware container and keep in the fridge until ready to use.
Prepare the tuna: dice the tuna finely. Add to a bowl and drizzle oil over, tossing to coat the tuna evenly. Keep in the fridge until ready to use.
To assemble: slice your fresh everything bagel in half. Optional to toast in a fry pan with olive oil or leave it soft and warm since it just came out of the oven! I toasted mine to get that golden exterior. Add a spoonful of green sauce over the bagel and layer on tuna tartare over the top. Garnish with a sprinkle of everything but the bagel seasoning and chopped fried shallots and a drizzle of truffle oil (optional). Enjoy straight away!
