Bikini Meal #1

I hate dieting. I honestly do. I think I would prefer to eat shards of glass than go on any grapefruit-only, rice cake-noshing, no carbs diet. Parsley is a garnish, not a meal.

However, it's mid-March. And that means that within a month and a half, we're going to be in our bathing suits. The nights of eating beef stew and lasagne are numbered. With the community pool right down the street, my roommate and I know this all too well. Tick tock, tick tock.

So there is a fine line that needs to be stepped in preparing for the coming summer months. If you're like me and a) you love to eat and b) you hate to diet, you want to keep feeding yourself real food while simultaneously watching the caloric intake. Most "diets" keep you at about 1200 calories per day, and if you live a regular life with running to and from work, chasing children, or even, egad, working out, that's far, far too low. So I've started "fooling" myself a little, finding ways to get the stuff I really want (salt, meat, carbs) without eating crap (salt, meat, carbs).

This dish is perfect in that regard. Fresh tuna from the North End fishmonger, a light salad of arugula and shaved pecorino, and a delicious stirfry of onions, red peppers, and zucchini. The long strips of zucchini will give you the impression of pasta, while the soy sauce and wasabi marinade on the tuna will give you the salty kick you need.

Tuna cooks ridiculously fast. Keep it on for no more than two minutes per side, otherwise you'll be stuck with something dry and pastey.

Bikini Prep Tuna Dinner

2 Tuna Steaks
1 1/2C soy sauce
1T powdered wasabi (or to taste, depending on your comfort level with hot sauce)

Marinade tuna for at least an hour. You're going to side-step covering your tuna in water-retaining salt by doing this. If you are serving this with a stir fry, get the vegetables going ahead of time. You can substitute vegetable broth for olive oil if you really want to watch your calories, and throw in some red pepper flakes for extra kick.

For the salad, my tip is to go very easy on the olive oil Dressing recipes always call for way too much olive oil in my opinion. For a tarter, more refreshing dressing, go easy on the oil and add in some dijon mustard, brown sugar, and lemon juice.