Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta

Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta
Photograph Copyright 2012 by Kelsey Wyatt

There are what seems like a hundred different "Helper" style meals in the average grocery store that combine some combination of meat (or fish), cheese and pasta into a big bowl with all sort of different seasonings included. Unfortunately, all of these hodgepodge style meals are such that wheat flour is a primary ingredient due to the noodles.

Without tripping too much on the toes of Betty Crocker and her legion of "Helper" meals, the Mrs. Leeper's folks have created a series of gluten-free pasta options that utilize corn pasta instead of wheat flour pasta as Betty has been so apt to do these many years. And the use of corn pasta is likely a good choice as the other option for such pasta dishes has usually been rice pasta and as anyone who is familiar with different types pasta is aware, rice pasta is rather delicate and corn pasta has a bit of strength to it.

Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta
Photograph Copyright 2012 by Kelsey Wyatt

If one were to compare "Tuna Helper" to the cloned version from Mrs. Leepers, the overall taste is a little different simply because corn pasta offers a different type of taste anyway, but the cheese sauce tastes different too, and this is likely on purpose as Mrs Leeper's probably needs to differentiate Creamy Tuna from Tuna Helper anyway for proprietary reasons.

Regarding the taste of the pasta as it was meant to be eaten with the added milk, butter and tuna, the meal is what one would expect for the combination of these particular foods and it would seem that the company's long history of offering gluten-free pasta in various formats has given them a lot of time to experiment with different recipes. The company also offers a variety of different pasta meals with combinations like Beef Stroganoff, Cheeseburger Mac and Beef Lasagna. 

Their Creamy Tuna recipe is a fun meal to try if you're willing to mix up all those ingredients and let it simmer for a year and a half (well, perhaps just twelve months as it likely depends on the type of pan you use and the quality of its heat transference). Such meals do tend to require very little preparation and a long amount of time spent on the stove so it's best to be patient when making such a meal.

Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta
Photograph Copyright 2012 by Kelsey Wyatt

As the back of the box would indicate, it's necessary to have some milk, tuna and butter on hand to mix in the pan although if someone were short the tuna, it might be possible to just make the plain pasta with the cheese (although, why would you? that would mean you were going to a lot of trouble to make a glorified version of macaroni and cheese)

Assuming you're patient enough to see this meal to its conclusion, these sorts of recipes do generally suggest that the cook allow the finished meal to settle for a bit in the pan after the pasta is at the desired consistency and this wait is a fairly important part of getting a good result out of this recipe as the cheese mixture will really firm up and adhere to the pasta much better if it's allowed to sit for just a short while after it's finished on the stove. Impatient cooks might find that the finished meal is too soupy. This is easily avoided by leaving it on the stove for a while without the heat on. About five minutes is all it needs.

The calories and fat in this particular meal aren't too out of line with one might assume the would be in a meal that was composed of a bunch of pasta, cheese and some tuna and so while it can be tempting to dump the entire batch into a large bowl and have at it, that's probably not an activity that anyone outside of a marathoner should consider.

Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta
Photograph Copyright 2012 by Kelsey Wyatt

Mrs Leeper's Creamy Tuna Pasta Report Card

The Good Stuff:

For anyone who has ever had Tuna Helper and had to switch over to a gluten-free lifestyle due to allergies, this particular Tuna Helper clone is a decent replacement and the corn pasta does hold up rather well to the rigors of boiling so the time that the mixture must simmer and settle isn't a problem and the end result has a pleasing consistency. 

What Could Improve:

The final verdict on this pasta is that it's a suitable replacement for the Betty Crocker style of tuna and pasta, but it could use a bit of extra kick with the seasonings that are included with the cheese mixture. It's also a good idea to toss some extra tuna in as the recipe seems to low-ball it on the amount that would work well for the overall mixture.