What to do with tuna can juice?

[LoveCareThinkDo]

Yup, this is a silly, silly question. Nevertheless....

I add about two cans of tuna to a can of soup for a quick, easy meal almost every day. Every day, that is one dirty soup can and two dirty tuna cans to deal with. At "home" I rinse them out thoroughly and just put them in the trash (no recycling around here). But that is a lot of water. Plus, there is that juice that you squeeze out of the can before dumping out the tuna. You gotta squish it out into something.

Now, I know not to squish or dump this kind of stuff on the ground. Not only does that break all kinds of rules, but it will attract critters, start to stink pretty bad, and would just be an asinine thing to do. 

Living in a minivan, I will not have a real sink, though I will have a large porta-potty. However, keeping one's food making stuff away from one's pooping stuff is usually a pretty good idea.

If I had a dog, I could just let said pupper lick the cans clean. However, as much as I really would like to have a dog, I am not in a position to be a responsible dog owner. 

So, what do all y'all non-sink-havers do about this kind of messy stuff, without using up a lot of water? 

Should I just find nearby vandwellers with handy-dandy, four-legged, can-licking machines that they can loan to me on a daily basis?

Should I just accept that I will need to make a trek to the dumpster almost every day? (I will not want dirty tuna cans sitting around in my minivan for a week.)


P.S. I know about the standard paper-towel & vinegar spray technique that folks use to clean their pots and plates. However, I don't really think that would be appropriate for this application, because it would be pretty hard to clean the corners of the cans, and that is a lot of extra paper towels going into the trash.

Thanks.

 

[cyndi]

Get the tuna in the foil packs. There's barely any juice. They're $1 at the dollar store and sometimes walmart

 

[WanderingRose]

Yes, foil packs, or adopt a nice kitty.

 

[max+sophia]

So, what do all y'all non-sink-havers do about this kind of messy stuff, without using up a lot of water? 

Would it work if you bought your tuna packed in a quality oil, like olive or other healthy oil, and put the whole shootin' shebang in your soup?  That way, just 1 paper towel should clean the residue out of the can. 

Keep zip bags handy, and put the can + towel into one before adding it to your trash.  Hopefully you have a airtight trash can???

 

[Trebor English]

I have a similar issue.  I used to eat tuna often.  Now I have gout and tuna is bad for that so I have substituted similar size cans of chicken.  I squeeze the juice into my non-sink.  This Harbor Freight waste oil container works like a sink with a built in 2 gallon grey water tank.  When I dump it I rinse it, shake well, rinse again and add a teaspoon of bleach.  Often I dump it in a toilet.  Sometimes I dig a hole and dump it like it's poop.

https://m.harborfreight.com/waste-oil-storage-container-97608.html

I have a 5 gallon plastic bucket with a screw on air tight lid.  I keep poop and garbage neatly bagged.  Cans go in the garbage.  Usually paper towels go in a can followed by grease or other liquid.  Sometimes the canned chicken juice goes there.

 

[MrNoodly]

Whether the tuna is packed in water or oil, why wouldn't you put the liquid in your soup?

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

Get the tuna in the foil packs. There's barely any juice. They're $1 at the dollar store and sometimes walmart

The pouches/packs are half the size of a can. And I can get Always Save 5oz cans for $0.90  at grocery stores that sell Always Save.  So, the cost of the pouches is more than double. I would have to put $4.00 worth of pouches into my soup. 

Sorry, I should have mentioned that I had already eliminated that possibility.

Though, I may have to go back to it if all else fails.

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

Would it work if you bought your tuna packed in a quality oil, like olive or other healthy oil, and put the whole shootin' shebang in your soup?  That way, just 1 paper towel should clean the residue out of the can. 

Keep zip bags handy, and put the can + towel into one before adding it to your trash.  Hopefully you have a airtight trash can???

I hadn't thought of switching to tuna in oil. Though, it is almost always in vegetable oil. I don't think I could stand that much extra oil in my soup. Any tuna that might come in fancy olive oil is likely going to be way too expensive. I eat tuna because it is cheap protein, with very little fat/oil.

I do have a food-grade 5 gallon bucket with a Gamma-Seal lid. It does completely contain even the most heinous of odors. I used to use it as my toilet. However, I have decided to switch to a porta-potty for pooping and had hoped to get rid of the bucket to free up more room in my tiny space. I guess, I could just use it as my trash can and not clean the cans at all. Squeeze all the juice into the trash, then throw the cans in there too. That is the simplest solution. With all the paper products that I will be putting in there, the juice should be absorbed relatively well.

I think this is the idea I am going to go with.

Thanks.

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

This Harbor Freight waste oil container works like a sink with a built in 2 gallon grey water tank. 

That's not a bad idea for a cheap, portable sink. You can get similar oil-change containers almost anywhere. I don't think I would want to use that for things like tuna juice because of the difficulty in cleaning the sink part. But it would be excellent for when one only needs a basin for water, like when washing face or hands.

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

Whether the tuna is packed in water or oil, why wouldn't you put the liquid in your soup?

Have you tasted food with the tuna juice in it? It is insanely fishy tasting. Much stronger tasting than the drained tuna itself. 

I once had a roommate from Shri-Lanka. He had never cooked anything with tuna from a can. He cooked some basic Mac-N-Cheese and put two cans of tuna in it... with the juice. OMG, I could hardly eat it.

 

[Reducto]

Dump the liquid into whatever you put urine into, put the cans into big Ziploc bags. Use the press shut bags, not zippers because those don't close fully. You can reuse the bags.

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

Get the tuna in the foil packs. There's barely any juice. They're $1 at the dollar store and sometimes walmart

After I shut down my computer last night, I remembered that part of the 5oz in a can is the juice I'm squishing out. So, I need to buy some tuna in pouches and compare the actual quantities of tuna "sans juice."

I'll let y'all know what I find.

 

[tav-2020]

gotta ask -- what kind of soup are you mixing the tuna into?

 

[Reducto]

Look at the nutrition labels and check the amount of protein per can/packet. That should give you a rough estimate of how much tuna there is.

 

[Weight]

I eat a lot of tuna. After much research I have settled on one from Walmart, "wild Albacore Tuna by Raincoast. It is canned in Canada with no added water, just what comes with the tuna. A bit more expensive, but well worth it for me. There are packers in the north west USA that pack the same way, but I only can find on internet.
Another one I like is Bella Portofino, Solid Yellowfin Tuna in E.V.O.O. Also known as Italian Tonno Style. Not very much oil, but very nutritious. I use it without draining.
Then there is canned Alaskan Salmon, I drink the water from those cans before using the fish.
Avoid any fish labeled Indonesia or China. I am not sure with Vietnam, but I mostly skip them.

 

[LoveCareThinkDo]

gotta ask -- what kind of soup are you mixing the tuna into?

I know this is pretty lame... but pretty much anything.  I even put tuna into chicken-noodle soup. 

Sacrilege, I know.

I have just enough Aspberger's to not like to try different foods, so I stick to the same damned thing all the time. Though that is perfect for vandwelling. 

My favorite right now is Campbell's Chunky Grilled Chicken & Sausage Gumbo. I take a package of ramen noodles, throw out the "flavor" packet, dump in two cans of drained tuna, then the soup, and add about a quarter cup of water (which I used to rinse the can out with). That makes a really hearty meal. 

I often get by on just a (large) bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, and then one meal of this gumbo "recipe" for an entire day. Eating only two meals a day really cuts down on cooking and cleanup time. 

I also add tuna (but no noodles) to Campbell's Chunky New England Clam Chowder. That is a good meal, but not enough to hold me for an entire day.

 

[MrNoodly]

I even put tuna into chicken-noodle soup. 

Sacrilege, I know.

Actually that makes perfect sense. The reason there's a Chicken of the Sea brand tuna is that CANNED tuna tastes almost identical to CANNED chicken.

 

[dextours]

Creatively reuse whatever eaten food containers you have. 

Empty peanut butter jars are great for liquid waste. Salsa, pasta sauce jars etc.

Put smelly trash in a potato chip bag, CAREFULLY use a lighter to melt it shut. Try that at your own risk.

Use soup cans for waste. I stuff used paper towels into them to soak up any soup left inside.

Look around amd McGyver whatever you have.

 

[max+sophia]

... it is almost always in vegetable oil. I don't think I could stand that much extra oil in my soup.

Caravan, I'm not sure how much oil is in the tuna you buy, but be careful of the newfangled idea to cut out all oil.  Your body needs good oils to carry vitamins through your system.  Of course if it's packed in water, the whole can can go in your soup, and you can then purchase good oil to use as needed. Olive oil is good.

I like your idea of adding tuna to soup, and I'm definitely going to give that a try.

 

[WanderingRose]

I think it would be good in cream of mushroom.

I sometimes cook a little linguine or some similar pasta and toss it with tuna and a little dried herbs.