Seared Tuna Steak with Dipping Sauce

In this 20-minute recipe for seared tuna steak, the fish is cooked in a hot skillet and then sliced and served with a spicy dipping sauce.

Course Appetizer

Cuisine Japanese

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 5

Total Time 20

Servings servings

Calories 314kcal

4 8-ounce Ahi tuna steaks 1.5-inch thick, sashimi-grade
1 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt or ½ teaspoon of any other salt, including Morton kosher salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons avocado oil for frying; can skip if using a well-seasoned cast-iron skillet

To make the dipping sauce, whisk together the sauce ingredients (soy sauce, lemon juice, garlic, honey, and red pepper flakes) in a small bowl. Let the sauce sit at room temperature while you cook the fish.
Season the tuna with salt and pepper on both sides.
Heat a heavy-bottomed skillet (such as a cast-iron skillet) over medium-high heat for about 3 minutes. Add the oil and swirl to coat. If your cast-iron skillet is well-seasoned, you can skip the oil.
Place the tuna in the hot pan. Cook until a golden crust has formed and the fish is medium-rare (red warm center), about 2 minutes per side.
Transfer the tuna steaks to a cutting board and cut them into 1⁄4-inch-thick slices.
Serve the tuna with the dipping sauce.

This dish can only be as good as the raw tuna you use. It's imperative to use sushi-grade tuna that has zero fishy smell. If your fish smells fishy in its raw state, even just slightly so, the end result will be fishy.
How long you cook the fish depends on how thick it is and on how hot your stove/pan gets. As a general rule, a 1.5-inch-thick tuna steak should be cooked for about 2 minutes per side over medium-high heat. A thinner steak (¾ to 1 inch) will need just 1-1.5 minutes per side. This is the type of recipe where there's no escaping the need to be flexible, loosely follow the recipe, but stay very aware of what's happening in your own kitchen with your own ingredients and equipment.
Ideally, the tuna should be cooked to rare or medium rare, but I should note that the CDC advises cooking fish to an internal temperature of 145°F. If you opt to leave it rare in the middle, make sure it is sashimi-grade and has been properly frozen.
Since the inside of the tuna steak is not fully cooked, I don't recommend keeping the leftovers. Try to make only as much as you'll eat immediately.