Easy Tomato Tuna (Best Vegan Poke Bowl!)

This easy tomato tuna poke bowl has plant-based tuna made with tomatoes, and all the fixings of your favorite poke bowls (including the spicy mayo)!

I always thought I was allergic to fish. Okay, I was allergic to fish as a kid, and assumed the allergy had stayed with me. So when I last visited Hawaii to visit my mermaid of a sister, the concept of trying a bite of the spicy tuna poke she bought from the back of a liquor store was simply off the table for me (the least of the reasons being because it was raw fish sold from the back of a liquor store).

But partially because I read that childhood allergies disappear in adulthood, and partially because I was just intrigued by this big bowl of fish, I tried a bite.

Not only did I not have a reaction, but I suddenly understood what all the fuss was about. This spicy tuna was soft and silky and spicy and umami, and I finally understood.

But the thing is, not only is tuna not vegetarian (duh), but it’s not all that sustainable. So I started digging into plant-based tuna alternatives and landed on this approach…tomato tuna!

Ingredients for these Vegan Poke Bowls

• Tomato: Tomato naturally has a meaty texture and umami taste, making it a great substitute for raw tuna. We’ll use roma tomatoes, which have less water and a meatier texture.
• Marinade: To infuse our tomato tuna with flavor, we’ll marinate it in a mixture of soy sauce, fresh ginger, sesame oil, lime juice, and sriracha.
• Sushi Rice: No good sushi bowl is complete with the slightly sweet, slightly vinegar sushi rice!
• Fillings: We’ll pile on some of the vegan sushi bowl classics, like nori, avocado, cucumber, carrot, and fried onions.
• Spicy Mayo: I have a hard time eating sushi that’s not doused in spicy mayo. We’ll make our own by quickly combining mayonnaise (traditional or vegan) with sriracha.

How to make vegan tuna with tomato

Making this tomato tuna recipe is so simple, and goes something like this:

1. Peel tomatoes: We’ll blanch them to make this super easy.
2. Marinate tomatoes: Salty soy sauce, smoky toasted sesame oil, and acidic lime juice combined with the flavors or fresh ginger and sriracha transform the humble roma tomato into vegan spicy tuna.
3. Serve: Piling this tomato tuna onto an equally flavorful sushi bowl is key. You can taste the tomato a little if you eat the “tuna” alone, but when you eat it with the sushi bowl fillings and spicy mayonnaise it really tastes like tuna!

Variations on these vegan sushi bowls

The nice thing about sushi bowls are how flexible they are! Here are a few possible variations:

• Change up the grains: To make this bowl a bit more nutrient-packed, you could substitute the sushi rice for quinoa, brown rice, or even cauliflower rice (though I would still recommend seasoning it with rice vinegar, sugar, and salt like we do with the sushi rice).
• Watermelon instead of tuna: Not a fan of tomatoes? Try using watermelon to make your tuna!
• Flexible fillings: And of course, you can fill your sushi bowls with whatever your favorite sushi vegetable fillings might be. The fillings I’ve included are just my favorites!

Hungry for more sushi?

Here are more of our favorite plant-based sushi recipes!

• Tempura Tofu Sushi
• Cucumber Sushi Rolls
• Green Goddess Sushi Bowl
• Greek Sushi Rolls
• Tofu Cucumber Sushi

And for another plant-based take on tuna, be sure to try out this Chickpea Tuna Salad – perfect on sandwiches! Or if you’re looking for another mock vegan fish, you HAVE to try our Beer-Battered Vegan Fish & Chips!