This Starkist Tuna Creations - Thai Chili came from Walmart. It's one of several flavor variations supplied in single serving pouches. Inexpensively priced at $1.28, it seemed worth investigating.
Initial impression upon opening the can pouch: 4.5/5.
I get that packing tuna in pouches is attractive to marketers. Convenience, no can opener, no draining, no waste. More label space for eye-catching graphics and a bigger facing per unit on retail shelves. On the other side, consumers have to carefully tear open the pack, probe deeply into the pouch to get all the product out, and what you get looks more like canned cat food than the image on the package represents. What kind of tuna you're getting is either vague or undeclared.
Let's Tear Into It
The pouch tore open without incident. Sometimes it doesn't go as anticipated. Squeezing open the pouch to dump out the tuna went about as expected. It all stuck to one side of the pouch, necessitating going in with fork to scrape it out. You can see that cat food appearance I was talking about.
The aroma is of the Thai chili flavoring, and it mostly masks any smell of tuna. The taste is similar, mostly the added flavoring dominant over the fish.
There's a mild, pleasant heat to it, and a sweetness that, while not unexpected, was a bit more than called for, I thought. The meat was satisfactorily moist, almost too moist to be natural, but I assume that's mainly due to water being the second ingredient on the list.
Sodium was a slightly above average 430mg, but the sweetness of the flavoring made it seem less so.
Starkist offers apparently 10 variations on this theme, and I see competitor Bumble Bee has a few of its own as well. I wasn't moved by this one enough to want to go out and buy others, irrespective of the low price point.
Main Takeaways
- Tasted more of flavoring than tuna
- Convenience in the eye of the beholder
Brand: Starkist
Description: Tuna with Thai chili
Species: N/S
Country of Origin: Ecuador
Source: FAO87, Southeast Pacific
Skin/Bones: No/No
Net Wt: 2.6 oz.
Price Range: $1.25
