What You Should Do If Your Tuna Salad Is Too Salty

Tuna salad is a lunchtime staple and pretty easy to make. A basic tuna salad recipe typically includes just canned tuna, celery, onion, carrot, mayonnaise, and spices. Occasionally, you might liven things up with some sugar, relish, cilantro and lime, or even Greek yogurt in lieu of your normal mayonnaise.

However, while tuna salad is pretty easy to make, there are some big mistakes you could be making with your tuna salad and not even realize it. These mistakes can include not chopping your veggies finely enough, using watery tuna instead of oil-packed tuna (and then not draining the tuna), or, in some cases, not balancing your flavors as you add in all of your spices and extra seasonings. While many tuna salad recipes keep your spices limited to salt and pepper, too much of either can really take your tuna salad from delicious and tasty to cringe-inducing.

So what can you do if you discover you've inadvertently added too much salt to your tuna salad?

Luckily, you don't need to toss that too-salty tuna salad in the trash bin and start anew. There are a few quick fixes you can use to balance your tuna salad's salty flavor.

To start, try adding something sweet to your tuna salad. As mentioned, sugar is a delicious add-in to your tuna salad; if you don't have plain white sugar on hand, you can use sweet relish. Extra vegetables can likewise help to mitigate the saltiness of your tuna salad; if you already have your salad filled with carrots, celery, and onions, try adding some diced tomatoes or even squash as well. You can also add in some extra mayonnaise, sour cream, or Greek yogurt.

Whatever option you go with, make sure to taste your tuna salad as you add your ingredients a little bit at a time. You don't want to accidentally overcorrect your tuna salad and end up with a mixture that's mouth-numbingly sweet.