Good fish??

Vinnie K

Hey all,

Now i know that most fish if not all is good for you for a number of reasons, but my question is more about canned fish, e.g a can of tuna in brine or similer, are these ok or is there too much salt or additives in the brine to preserve the fish, grabbing a can of ready cooked fish is so easy and tasty for a snack and especially when im up the walls in work.
What types of canned fish do you guys eat or recommend??
Thanks in advance!!
Vinnie.

PeakOutput

i eat tuna in brine at the moment as it is lower in cals than in olive oil, never really thought about the salt content. ill be going back to tuna in olive oil as soon as the current cans are used as the taste factor to fat factor is not worth it imo and also olive oil is good for you.

edit; does anyone eat sardines??? if so what are they like?

juanveron45

When you eat fish out of a can make sure its in brine or water as the tuna in vegetable oil has too many calories and the oil thats added is not natural oil from the fish.If you want an oily fish go with wild salmon/trout and mackeral

PeakOutput

juanveron45 wrote:

When you eat fish out of a can make sure its in brine or water as the tuna in vegetable oil has too many calories and the oil thats added is not natural oil from the fish.If you want an oily fish go with wild salmon/trout and mackeral

as far as i know john west tuna is tinned with olive oil not vegetable(open to correction) which is not a bad thing as long as you drain it off

mack1

nah, it's sunflower oil, eating a can right now!

Dont have a brine can handy but from what i remember the kcals where not too different, 132kcals for the 100g little can of tuna steak with oil - i think the brine one is around 125ish - anyone got one handy?

also, somebody on here before reccommend the steak as appose to the tuna chunks - i think there is more meat in the steaks!

iascanmore

PeakOutput wrote:

i eat tuna in brine at the moment as it is lower in cals than in olive oil, never really thought about the salt content. ill be going back to tuna in olive oil as soon as the current cans are used as the taste factor to fat factor is not worth it imo and also olive oil is good for you.

edit; does anyone eat sardines??? if so what are they like?

I eat a lot of fish - vac packed mackeral/salmon/trout fillets (superquinn, lidl etc), some some tinned - mackeral/sardines/pilchards/skippers etc in oil - least favourite - but a nice snack at night or in an emergency! Don't buy cheap - John West or that Scottish brand being the best.

For fresh bought stuff, I avoid the main supermarkets and prefer a proper fishmongers - Dublin is not badly served, in fact there is one only a few doors up from Jon at pronutrion (has funny opening hours).

Last but not least I catch a lot, fresh water - we're talking brown trout, (very) occasinal salmon, from the salt you've mackeral, the odd bass, winter codling etc etc.

It amazes me that we as a nation eat so little fish, especially when they're everywhere.

Edit: Lidl do frozen tuna steaks for a few quid - not bad at all!

rubyred

Sunny South canned tuna in brine has waaaay less salt that any other brand of tinned tuna. It's the only kind I eat - although sometimes hard to get so you have to stock up. You can usually get it in Tesco in three-packs. It's in a blue wrapper.

eclectichoney

I think they also do John West Tuna in springwater now too??

siochain

iascanmore wrote:

Edit: Lidl do frozen tuna steaks for a few quid - not bad at all!

Well tasty. one take a few mins in the george foreman.

AlphaMale 3OO

juanveron45 wrote:

When you eat fish out of a can make sure its in brine or water as the tuna in vegetable oil has too many calories and the oil thats added is not natural oil from the fish.If you want an oily fish go with wild salmon/trout and mackeral

Why does it have too many calories? What basis do you have for this? How much is too many? If your eating a high calorie diet theres nothing wrong with it and it can even be used as a meal replacement. Its within context Juan, think before you talk!:)

juanveron45

Why does it have too many calories? What basis do you have for this? How much is too many? If your eating a high calorie diet theres nothing wrong with it and it can even be used as a meal replacement. Its within context Juan, think before you talk!

Whatever healthy plan your on whether its for muscle gain or fatloss you want to make sure that almost every calorie you take in is accounted for, just because someone is on a high calorie plan doesnt mean they should eat everything or anything, by that reckoning they could stuff there faces with crap all day and still get results.

I believe everyones diet should have at least 20-30% fat but the type of fat in that diet is important, the oils added to tuna fish is to but it bluntly are bad for you.Your much better off either getting your fats from natural sources like nuts and oily fish like salmon/trout and mackeral.Or from flax or udos oil .Tuna is its natural from has very little fat and the fat added isnt the best source.The fats you need all have omega 3 and omega 6 which is the EFA'S essentail fatty acids

See I did think before I talked

PeakOutput

juanveron45 wrote:

Whatever healthy plan your on whether its for muscle gain or fatloss you want to make sure that almost every calorie you take in is accounted for, just because someone is on a high calorie plan doesnt mean they should eat everything or anything, by that reckoning they could stuff there faces with crap all day and still get results.

I believe everyones diet should have at least 20-30% fat but the type of fat in that diet is important, the oils added to tuna fish is to but it bluntly are bad for you.Your much better off either getting your fats from natural sources like nuts and oily fish like salmon/trout and mackeral.Or from flax or udos oil .Tuna is its natural from has very little fat and the fat added isnt the best source.The fats you need all have omega 3 and omega 6 which is the EFA'S essentail fatty acids

See I did think before I talked

you implied they are bad due to their calorie content though........they are not

Everything about your diet is relative to what your goals are. if you want to eat as clean as humanly possible grand they are not going to be conducive to that diet. There are numerous goals that a tin of tuna in oil can be a part of and you would still be eating healthily they are not a "crap" food imo

juanveron45

Because fat is so calorie dense(9kcal per g) as opposed to carbs and protein(4 kcals per g) you want to make sure that the fat you take in is of the best quality, a 185g can of tuna in veg oil has twice as many cals as a 185g can in brine.

Granted tuna oil is not junk food compared to chips and burgers but why choose it when you have better choices like tuna in brine you get the same amount of tuna minus the fat so then theres room for the really good fats in your diet

PeakOutput

juanveron45 wrote:

but why choose it when you have better choices like tuna in brine you get the same amount of tuna minus

Like I said the health to taste ratio is not big enough to put me off using it. and eating it does not turn my good diet bad

juanveron45

Like I said the health to taste ratio is not big enough to put me off using it. and eating it does not turn my good diet bad

You would be surprised, especially if you eat tuna everyday

150 extra calories is about 1000 calories a week, 4000 a months 48000 in a year

With 3500 calories in a lb of fat

That 13-14 lbs saving or on you in a year

But at the end of the day we live in a free world so you can take my advice or you can do what you want

PeakOutput

juanveron45 wrote:

You would be surprised, especially if you eat tuna everyday

150 extra calories is about 1000 calories a week, 4000 a months 48000 in a year

With 3500 calories in a lb of fat

That 13-14 lbs saving or on you in a year

all that makes very little difference if

a) i dont eat tuna everyday

b) my goal is not weight loss

im only arguing now coz im bored so prob best I stop the op has his answer they are not as good but they are not bad

mikemac

iascanmore wrote:

I eat a lot of fish - vac packed mackeral/salmon/trout fillets (superquinn, lidl etc), some some tinned - mackeral/sardines/pilchards/skippers etc in oil - least favourite - but a nice snack at night or in an emergency! Don't buy cheap - John West or that Scottish brand being the best.

Can I ask what's wrong with cheap brands?
I'd buy mainly Tesco brand or Picnic and John West are far, far more expensive.
I realy don't think that a brand name means the quality is that much better.

But I'm open to correction, are cheap brands (Tesco, Supervalu,etc) a bad idea? A lot of students read boards and cheapskates like me:p so it'd be good to know

Edit: I like the way Tesco put nutrition information in an easy to read format on their products these days. It'd be a good idea for other companies to do the same

g'em

micmclo wrote:

Can I ask what's wrong with cheap brands?

nothing!! Don't mind all that nonsense. I eat a tin of tuna (if not two) every day. I buy in bulk as cheap as I can get it. As long as the ingredients list says: tuna, water, (possibly salt) I'm happy. I've just got up out of my very comfy couch and checked the tins of two different brands of tuna - Sunny South and Tesco - both tuna chunks, both in brine. Both have the same three ingredients, both have 0.6g of fat per 100g, 23.5g protein and.. oh wait... stop the press... Tesco tuna has 100cals and SS has only 99!!! :eek:

ffs lads get over it. Tins of tuna are tins of tuna. The price difference is mostly down to packaging and advertising, it's simple economics.

micmclo, eat the cheap tins to your heart's content


/sits back and waits for someone to mention mercury poisoning....

PeakOutput

/sits back and waits for someone to mention mercury poisoning....

dolphin friendly nets????/ or are they myths from the john west advertising

g'em

PeakOutput wrote:

dolphin friendly nets????/ or are they myths from the john west advertising

ah jeebus ye pedantic sh**e

Well Sunny South is labelled 'Dolphin Safe' and they use skipjack tuna. Tesco however is labelled 'Dolphin Friendly' and doesn't say which spp it uses (so it's most likely bluefin). I know this because I got out of my comfy couch AGAIN to check

afaik dolphin 'safe' IS actually better than dolphin 'friendly' and animal welfare orgs have called for those who use the term to remove it from the lables.

PeakOutput

g'em wrote:

ah jeebus ye pedantic sh**e

its just the well hidden green in me making its annual appearance....dont worry its gone now till next year

juanveron45

Tuna in brine always gets the thumps up from me ,its the added oil im disputing

iascanmore

micmclo wrote:

Can I ask what's wrong with cheap brands?
I'd buy mainly Tesco brand or Picnic and John West are far, far more expensive.
I realy don't think that a brand name means the quality is that much better.

But I'm open to correction, are cheap brands (Tesco, Supervalu,etc) a bad idea? A lot of students read boards and cheapskates like me:p so it'd be good to know

Edit: I like the way Tesco put nutrition information in an easy to read format on their products these days. It'd be a good idea for other companies to do the same

Please note I did not include tinned tuna in above statement, I avoid the stuff like the plague - it just doesn't do it for me. Now mackeral - theres a fish I know a lot about. I've probably eaten more than every poster to this thread combined, we were rared on the stuff:eek:
This year has not been great for them but in the past 2 months, I've cold smoked them, hot smoked them, pickled them (roll mops), BBQ'd them on the beach within seconds of them leaving the water. I'd normally have a chest freezer full by now for bait/eating over the winter. Take it from me, John West and other brands are far tastier than Tesco/generic tins. The raw material is obviously the same, so it must be the processing which makes the difference. Get a tin of both and open, the JW will smell better, hold together better and not be all "scalely".

Hide tides in the north Dublin area over the weekend are around 9 PM for anyone wanting to try for some freebies:)

AlphaMale 3OO

juanveron45 wrote:

Tuna in brine always gets the thumps up from me ,its the added oil im disputing

You've gone from asking a multitude of questions to suddenly dictating what is 'too many calories' and an expert on fat injestion in the space of 2 days. I defended you but your misinforming people. Its obvious tuna in oil is higher in cals. Let people make the choice in relation to their goals. Do not dictate what is too much and then insult our intelligence with silly mathermatical calculations. 300 cals in a can of tuna is too much for my girlfriend trying to lose weight. Its not too much for me trying to bulk up.

Mellor

juanveron45 wrote:

a 185g can of tuna in veg oil has twice as many cals as a 185g can in brine.

Juan, you appear to have gone into this alot. But could you produce a source for this info.

According to Mack1

132kcals for the 100g little can of tuna steak with oil

I have a can of brine tuna here, John West also, and it is 113cal per 100g
So that works out at about 19 cals extra per 100g.
I am not saying this is gospel, as I can't verify Macks statement at this time, but one of you is wrong.

juanveron45

The vegetable oil added to most tuna hasnt got a good balance of omega 3 and 6 there are way better sources.

mack1

Just to clarify, the John West 100g can says "Per Can: 132kcals" but the 100g can has a drained weight of 70g. (I didn't read this bit when I posted yesterday) So I suppose I should have said 132kcals for 70g - apologies for the confusion.
That works out at 189kcals per 100g.


As for the overall debate, I agree with whoever said the taste/calorie ratio is not significant enough to make me eat the brine one! I eat a can or 2 of tuna a day, I drain the oil, but obviously the fish absorbs some so it's not as dry as drained brine tuna.

liamo

PeakOutput wrote:

dolphin friendly nets????/ or are they myths from the john west advertising

I prefer Tuna-friendly dolphin. High in protein, low in fat. Mmmmmmm.

Mellor

mack1 wrote:

Just to clarify, the John West 100g can says "Per Can: 132kcals" but the 100g can has a drained weight of 70g. (I didn't read this bit .

I dont know about the oil one, but the brine tin says per 100g drained weight.