Subway Tuna Salad is great for a tasty lunch or dinner. Make a classic tuna salad sandwich, wrap, or salad with your favorite toppings. There is no need to go to the restaurant when homemade tuna salad with this copycat recipe is much better. You will find it is easy to make your own Subway Tuna Sandwiches at home.Â
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Best Tuna Salad
Just because a tuna salad sandwich is quick and easy to prepare doesn’t mean it must be bland. Take this copycat Subway Tuna Salad recipe, for example.
You can whip it up in only a few minutes, but it’s a deliciously satisfying meal for lunch or dinner at home or perfect for anyone who is brown-bagging it.
Subway restaurants may be known for their sandwich artists, but there isn’t any reason why you can’t make an even better tuna salad hoagie!
Why is this the Best Subway Tuna Salad Recipe?
There are countless recipes for tuna salad online. Many are fancy, calling for expensive tuna or herbs and other seasonings. Who needs it?
Subway’s tuna salad recipe is barebones and allows the authentic taste of the fish to be front and center. The mild tuna salad flavor becomes the perfect base for adding your favorite toppings.
Whether you want to keep your Subway tuna salad sandwiches with shredded lettuce and sliced tomatoes or spice things up with pickled jalapenos, red onions, and a few cheese slices, the choice is yours!
Subway Tuna Salad Ingredients
There are a few components to this tuna sub sandwich. There’s the basic sandwich with tuna salad, cheese, and bun. Then you have the various vegetable toppings and sub dressings if desired. Here’s a list of what you need:
Tuna Salad Sandwich
- Water-packed tuna – I recommend yellowfin tuna
- Mayonnaise
- White American cheese slices
- Sub sandwich buns
Vegetable Toppings
- Shredded lettuce
- Tomato Slices
- Cucumbers
- Bell peppers
- Red onion slices
- Black Olives
- Dill pickle slices
- Sliced jalapenos
Sub Sandwich Dressing
- Oil – Canola or light olive oil is best.
- Red wine vinegar
Ingredient Substitutions
One reason why Subway’s sandwiches are so famous is that they offer such a wide range of toppings. But, when you make a Subway Tuna Salad sandwich at home, you have even more options.
Here are just a few topping suggestions that Subway doesn’t offer, along with alternative must-have ingredients.
Consider adding some of these toppings to your sandwich:
- Sundried tomatoes
- Avocados
- Sprouts
- Tarragon
- Apple slices
- Chopped hardboiled eggs
Tuna Types
There are a lot of different choices when it comes to tuna. Although the recipe calls for canned tuna in water, there is no reason why you can’t use oil-packed tuna instead.
When choosing your tuna, remember that anything labeled as skipjack or light tuna comes from smaller tuna species that typically have lower mercury levels.
Mayonnaise Alternatives
Mayo provides the creaminess that is so essential for a good tuna sub. However, depending on diet philosophy, it is considered either healthy (low-carb/keto) or not the healthiest ingredient (low-fat/low-calorie).
- Save calories and fat by using a light mayo instead.
- If you want to eliminate mayo, many people like to substitute sour cream or Greek yogurt.
- Another fantastic alternative is mashed avocado with a touch of white vinegar or lemon juice to add acidity.
Tuna Sandwich Bread Choices
You can change the entire tuna sandwich with your choice of bread. For the sake of your teeth, you should probably stay away from any crusty bread, but ciabatta or even focaccia bread are excellent choices.
If you are a bit daring, try something sweet, like raisin-nut bread, for a totally unique taste experience.
How to Make Subway Tuna Salad
Here are the simple steps for making this Subway tuna recipe:
- Prepare tuna salad by first draining excess water from the tuna. Place drained tuna in a small bowl, and flake tuna with a fork.
- Add mayonnaise, and stir well to combine.
- Cut sub sandwich bread in half.
- Build the sandwich by first placing small scoops of tuna salad on the top portion of the bun.
- Place desired toppings on the bottom portion of the bun.
- Then cut the cheese squares into triangles and place 2 triangles on top of the vegetables.
- Dress the sandwich with a squirt of mayonnaise, oil, and vinegar if desired.
- Then close the bun and enjoy!
Recipe Variations
No need to just make a tuna salad sandwich. Here are some great ways to make it as a tuna melt, wrap, or salad instead.
Tuna Melt: Place the scoops of tuna on the bottom half of the bun and top with cheese. Put the tuna and cheese topped bottom bun and the top bun on a baking sheet. Broil until the cheese is melted. Add toppings if desired.
Tuna Salad Wrap: Place the tuna salad and toppings on a large flour tortilla and roll it up burrito-style.
Tuna Salad Salad: Place the shredded lettuce in a bowl. Top with vegetables, cheese, and scoops of tuna salad. Dress with oil and vinegar or a vinaigrette dressing.
What Goes Well with a Tuna Salad Sub?
This tuna fish recipe from Subway deserves a salty side dish to help balance the flavors. Potato chips are great; the crunchier, the better.
Try crunchifying your sandwich by topping the tuna salad with a handful of your favorite thick-cut potato chips.
Are you more of a fries person? That’s great, too!
Of course, you’ll need something to wash everything down, and the best way to do that is with something bubbly. Soda, seltzer, or even beer go great with this copycat Subway tuna salad recipe.
How to Store Tuna Salad
You can easily halve this tuna fish salad recipe by using only one can and a tablespoon of mayonnaise. But if you have any leftovers, keep them fresh in the fridge in an airtight container.
Remember, oxygen is the enemy, so use the smallest container you can, and press plastic wrap directly on top of the tuna to prevent it from drying out.
How Long Does Tuna Salad Last?
The tuna fish recipe from Subway keeps in the fridge for up to three days.
I hope you give this copycat recipe for Subway’s tuna sandwich a try soon. Food tastes better when you make it at home. You can make this with the tuna you like best, and you can modify this recipe any way you like.
Favorite Sandwich Recipes
- Bell Beefer
- Cheddars Monte Cristo
- Chicken Fried Steak Sandwich
- Chicken Salad Chick Egg Salad
- Homemade Ham Salad
- Patty Melt
- Pizza Burgers
- Sandwich Dressing
- Subway Chicken Salad
- Whataburger Chicken Sandwich
More Tuna Recipes
Check out more of my easy sandwich recipes and the best fast food recipes here on CopyKat!
Subway Tuna Salad Sandwich
Ingredients
- 2 5-ounce cans water-packed tuna
- 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
- 2 6-inch sub sandwich buns
- 1 cup shredded lettuce
- 6 slices tomatoes
- 1/4 cup sliced cucumbers
- 1/4 cup sliced green bell peppers
- 1/4 cup sliced red onions
- 1/4 cup sliced black olives
- 10 slices dill pickles
- 10 slices jalapeños
- 2 slices white American cheese
- 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
Instructions
- To prepare the tuna salad, drain the excess water from the tuna. Place the drained tuna in a small bowl, and flake with a fork.
- Add the mayonnaise and stir well to combine.
- Cut each sandwich bun in half lengthwise.
- Place two small scoops of tuna salad on the top portion of each bun.
- On the bottom portion of each bun, add shredded lettuce and a few slices of tomato, green bell pepper, red onion, black olives, and pickled jalapeños.
- Cut the cheese squares into triangles and add 2 triangles on top of the vegetables on each sandwich.
- Add a squirt of mayonnaise if desired, close the buns, and serve.
Juliette
I made this for my boyfriend and let me tell you… he was obsessed. 😉
Ramona N Redding
I love subway they are the best
Hillary Clinton
i worked at subway. our tuna was just tuna and cheap real mayo. we ordered from Sysco foods. subway is the reason i love cheap off brand mayo. i know, its crazy. and i would never admit it to anyone in real life. when subway first got soup (not sure if they still have it) it was frozen in the bag, it was the exact same soup panera bread, or at that time called st. louis bread co, used and we charged half the price.
Sam
Made these for the family, my picky kids loved this!