WHAT ARE THEY?
Skewers of lightly seared tuna, coated in toasted sesame seeds, served cold, topped with olive tapenade.
TIME TO MAKE
Preparation: 30–45 minutes
Cooking: 15 minutes
Resting: 1 hour in the freezer
EQUIPMENT
25 × 6–8 cm long wooden cocktail skewers
Food processor
Microwave-safe plastic wrap
VARIATION
Replace the tuna with beef, and the sesame seeds with poppy seeds.
TECHNIQUES TO MASTER
Making a ballotine
ADVICE
Wrap the ballotines tightly so that the sesame seeds stick and the tuna has a good shape.
TRICKY ASPECTS
Cooking the tuna: it must stay raw in the middle. Making the ballotines.
ORGANISATION
1 day before | Make the tuna ballotines, sear them, make the tapenade, put the tuna on the cocktail skewers.
On the day | Do the final assembly.
MAKES 25
SESAME-CRUSTED TUNA
75 g sesame seeds
500 g bluefin tuna
salt
30 g olive oil
TAPENADE
100 g (⅔ cup) pitted Taggiasca olives
10 g capers
30 g extra-virgin olive oil
25 g sun-dried tomatoes
5 g anchovies in oil
½ garlic clove
1 Quickly wash the olives and capers, then drain, pushing on them lightly to bruise. Blend all the ingredients to obtain a more or less smooth purée, then set aside in the refrigerator in a piping bag without a nozzle. Preheat the oven to 170°C, then toast the sesame seeds for 15 minutes. Cut the tuna lengthways into four to six 2 cm thick slices.
2 Season with salt, then roll in the toasted sesame seeds. Roll each slice of fish into a ballotine. Set aside in the freezer for 1 hour.
3 Remove the plastic wrap from the tuna. Heat the oil in a frying pan over a high heat then sear each ballotine for 30 seconds on each side. Drain on paper towel.
4 Once cooled, cut the ballotines into slices 1 cm thick.
5 Put two slices on each cocktail skewer. Arrange the skewers on a platter, pipe a dot of tapenade on each tuna piece and serve.