Cooking Mama | Food

How to Make Baked Tuna Pie Melt Using White Bread

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A local food chain here in the Philippines has popularized the affordable tuna pie. There are also tuna pie recipes online, but most are fried. To avoid having excess oil in our diet from frying bread, I have come up with the baked tuna pie melt using white bread as the dough. It’s easy to make and is very yummy. You can adjust your ingredients, too, like add more vegetables for more fiber content. Try my baked tuna pie melt recipe using white bread at home and tell me what you think.

Baked Tuna Pie Melt Using Gardenia Loaf Bread

Making baked tuna pie melt became very easy since I discovered that Gardenia Loaf Bread is perfect for the dough. No kneading necessary, just flatten the bread and it’s good as dough.

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~ Gardenia white bread was perfect for this purpose — it became a really smooth and nice dough for my tuna pie. ~

It was a good way for me to feed the kids tuna, which is rich in protein, as well as assorted vegetables. Plus, the cheese inside just made this snack so wonderful. With homeschooling kids, I try to prepare healthy meals for them that could feed their minds and bodies.

You can make it for your afternoon snack or breakfast — it’s just soooo good!

In many recipes, they fry pies using bread for the dough. But I am well aware that bread absorbs a lot of oil and I don’t want the family to ingest additional cooking oil. So I took the baked route and I didn’t regret it.

Cooking Hack

If you do not have an oven at home, you can try the oven toaster but you have to watch the cooking process. Since the oven toaster does not have a temperature adjustment, you will just have to check if your pies look cooked enough or the crust is already toasty. You can just open the toaster to check your pies and it won’t be a problem.

If both oven and toaster are unavailable, then you will have to fry this tuna pie. Just place them on paper towels afterward.

Note: If you are going to fry your pies, egg wash is no longer needed.

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~ Beautifully baked tuna pies. ~

Aside from tuna, you can use other meats like pork, beef, or chicken. It’s entirely up to you. Enjoy!

Baked Tuna Pie Melt Ingredients:

  • 2 Tbsps. butter
  • 1 carrot, diced
  • 1 potato, diced and soaked in ½ cup water
  • Salt and black pepper
  • 5 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 2 cans tuna (any kind)
  • Dried herbs (e.g. basil, tarragon, oregano)
  • 3 leaves pechay, sliced
  • 1 can mushrooms, diced
  • 250 ml or 1 cup evaporated milk
  • 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
  • Brown sugar, to taste
  • ½ cup bread crumbs
  • Grated cheese (I used queso de bola)
  • Gardenia sliced white bread (1 loaf)
  • A slice of cheese
  • Flour paste (1 Tbsp. flour dissolved in a little water)
  • Egg wash (scrambled egg + softened butter)
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~ I love the colorful combination of the ingredients. More color means more flavor, texture, and nutrients, too. ~

Kitchen Hack
I used 1 can tuna in brine and 1 spicy corned tuna for extra flavor. You can use any kind, actually, but corned tuna is obviously more flavorful. If you have kids, then obvious, you go slow with the level of spiciness.

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~ The egg wash I used was a combination of scrambled egg and melted butter. It gave a beautiful coat on my pies. ~

Procedure:

I will separate the cooking process from making the tuna filling to the actual baking of the pieces.

To cook the tuna filling:

  • 1. In a pan, melt butter and fry the carrots. Season with salt and cook for a few minutes.
  • 2. Stir in the potatoes with the water. Remember to season with a pinch of salt with each addition. Sprinkle some black pepper and mix well.
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~ Before I saute, I fry the carrots in butter and season them. This way, the carrots are well-cooked and the children will accept them. ~
  • 3. After 3 minutes, you can add in the tuna and sprinkle some dried herbs of your choice. I used basil, tarragon, and oregano because these are all good for seafood. Mix well and cook for about 2 minutes.
  • 4. If you are using Chinese pechay, separate the stems and cook it first about 2 minutes before adding the leaves and then the mushrooms. Season again and mix well.
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~ Cooking the filling — the toughest vegetables go in first. ~
  • 5. Stir in the evaporated milk and lemon juice. I added about 1 Tbsp. brown sugar. Mix well, taste, and adjust the seasoning according to your taste.
  • 6. To thicken the tuna pie filling, stir in the bread crumbs and about ½ cup grated cheese. Allow the cheese to melt and turn off the heat.
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~ The breadcrumbs thicken the filling. ~
  • 7. Let the filling cool down a bit.

Assemble the tuna pie:

  • 1. Using a rolling pin, flatten two pieces of white bread at a time. Don’t flatten them altogether because exposing the bread to the air will dry it out. You may want to cut the edges but using Gardenia white bread, I wanted to preserve it. It gave my pies a really crusty edge that tastes so good and so interesting to eat.
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~ Use a rolling pin to flatten the bread. If you don’t have a rolling pin, use a spoon. But it will take much long though. ~
  • 2. Put some filling in the middle, leaving about 1 cm margin all around. Put a little of the flour paste all over and cover this with the second piece of bread. Press the edges down with a fork.
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~ This is how the inside of my pie looked. ~
  • 3. Once you have completed the number of pieces that can fit in your oven, brush the egg wash on one side then bake.
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~ Use a fork to seal the edges. ~

To cook:

  • 1. You may want to pre-heat the oven or just heat them when you are ready to eat the pies. Brush the egg wash when you are ready to bake.
  • 2. Bake the pies on a rack at 180°C for 15 minutes. Since I didn’t put a pan under the grill, there was no need to turn the pies upside down.

Serving Suggestion

Prepare the baked tuna pie melt when you are about to eat because it is best consumed when hot. That way, the cheese is gooey and melted inside.

This recipe made us 16 pies and it was quite a lot. That was our dinner because it is already a complete meal by itself. The tuna was our protein, the bread was the carbohydrates, and then we had lots of vegetables in it for fiber. Since the corned tuna I used was a bit spicy, the tuna pie melt tasted good with some lettuce.

Other Homecooking Recipes

Meanwhile, check out these other homecooking recipes where your kids will happily eat vegetables.

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15 thoughts on “How to Make Baked Tuna Pie Melt Using White Bread

  1. Cant wait to try this recipe mommy. Mas okay nga syang baked kesa fried less oil..surely magugustuhan to ng hubby ko..

  2. Wow ang bongga naman. So creative niyo mamsh. Ang sobrang tipid sa. Recipes pero hindi sa sarap and sustansiya.. Must do this mamsh lalo pa’t very easy to make. Thank you for sharing this amazing ideas mamsh.

  3. Super sarap nito for sure mommy. Perfect ito sa picky eater kong panganay. For sure magugustuhan niya. Para maiba naman ang kinakain niya. Sarap pa ng Gardenia. Pwedeng pwede pa sa mga walang oven katulad ko. Easy pa to prepare.

  4. Wow thank you for sharing this recipe mommy..I will try it soon.
    Magugustuhan po ito ng family ko for sure..Home made tuna pie,So yummy

  5. Naku mommy perfect na perfect to para sa dinner namin.. Happy tummy malamang pag natry ko itong recipe na to.. Ang healthy pa nya because of the vegetables inclusion..yay cant wait to try this

  6. Thank you for sharing this Baked Tuna Pie Melt mommy. Surely magugustuhan to ng mga kasama ko sa bahay. Trying this out soon. Perfect talaga pang snacks. Thanks also sa mga cooking hacks you shared mommy. Love it❤️❤️

  7. Ang galing naman ni Achi Dindin, talagang love na love niya ang pagluluto. Future Chef! Kanino po ba siya nagmana ng hilig sa cooking?

  8. Gusto ko matry ang recipes nato..looks super yummy talaga.. Overload sa fillings im sure busog talaga ang buong family. Perfect sa breakfast and meryendas

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