Tuna Ceviche from Tulum’s Hartwood

Ceviche de Atún

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Ingredients

1 pound tuna steaks, skin removed
2 tablespoons kosher salt
½ cup dried chamomile or organic chamomile tea (or dried herb of choice, such as basil or oregano)

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Instructions

Trim away the deep purple blood line that runs through the tuna to remove as much of the iron-tasting blood as you can. Sprinkle with the salt and chamomile, put in an airtight container, and refrigerate for 30 to 45 minutes.

Rinse the tuna to remove the chamomile and salt and pat dry with paper towels. Angle your knife at 45 degrees and make thin ¼-inch-thick cuts against the grain. Be careful to make one fluid cut for each slice; cutting in a sawing motion will destroy the flesh. Put the slices in a medium bowl and add the leche de tigre (instructions below), turning to coat.

Remove the tuna slices from the liquid and divide among individual serving bowls. Spoon enough leche de tigre onto each plate to just cover the bottom of the bowl. Garnish with the avocado, grapefruit, cucumber, radishes, jalapeño, and dried chamomile.

Ruby Red Leche de Tigre

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Ingredients

1 carrot, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
1 cucumber, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
1 small beet, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
1 small red onion, cut into ½-inch-thick slices
3 tomatoes, cut into 2-inch pieces
1 serrano chile
¼ cup fresh lime juice (from 2 to 3 limes)
2 cups coconut water, or more to taste
¾ cup fresh grapefruit juice
Kosher salt

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Instructions

Pass the carrot, cucumber, beet, red onion, tomatoes, and serrano through a juicer. (Alternatively, use a blender: Put the carrot, cucumber, beet, onion, tomatoes, serrano, lime juice, and half the coconut water in a blender and blend on high speed until liquefied, 1 to 2 minutes. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve; discard the solids.)

Combine the vegetable liquid, lime juice (unless you used a blender), grapefruit juice, and (the remaining) coconut water in a bowl and mix well. Add salt to taste. (If the mixture is too spicy, add more coconut water.) Set aside.

Garnishes

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Ingredients

1 Hass avocado, halved, pitted, peeled, and thinly sliced
1 grapefruit, suprêmed
½ cup diced peeled, seeded cucumber
2 radishes, julienned
1 jalapeño, thinly sliced
Dried chamomile

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Instructions

To "suprême" citrus: This is a classic restaurant technique for trimming off all the peel and bitter pith and separating the sections from the membranes so that all that is left is fruit. The secret is to use a super-sharp knife, which will cut with little effort; if the knife is dull, you’ll need to apply some pressure, and that’s where you get into trouble.

First, slice off the top and bottom of the fruit so that you see two tiny circles of flesh. Then, slice off the skin, pith, and outer membrane, following the curvature of the fruit. Trim off any white patches left after you cut off all the peel.

Now you can either stop here and just cut the fruit into ½-inch slices, or you can follow this standard chef’s technique. Holding the fruit in one hand and the knife in the other, working over a small bowl, slice as close as possible to the membranes that separate the sections: Slice along one, then the other, and flick the loosened section into the bowl. When the entire fruit has been sectioned, squeeze the juice from the remaining membranes with your hand and reserve for another use.

Excerpted from Hartwood by Eric Werner and Mya Henry with Christine Mulke and Oliver Strand (Artisan Books). Copyright © 2015. Photographs by Gentl & Hyers.