best way to cook occies..

[Bawley]

Hi all....

I just thought id share this with anyone that has caught octopus as a by catch ( usually when fishing 4 other species as I have on countless occasions )...

ive been catching these things for years.... tried smashing against rocks..... rubbing..... bbq ing....even some of my greek so called occy cooking experts have bbq them ( joke )... and they are still tough as leather!

heres a good recipe i scored from an italian chef at balmain!!

1. clean occy and take as much skin off as possible...

2. marinate for about 4 hours in olive olive oil, crushed garlic, basil and parsley.. salt and pepper ( ground )...

3. pre heat oven to 120 degrees....

4. place the occy and marinate together in a baking dish... then add white wine and red wine ( semillon sauvignon blanc ) and red wine ( shiraz ) and add some lemon juice...

5. cover with foil and cook for 4 hours..... yes 4 hours ( seems like a long time )!!!!

6. then take out of oven and sear the occy on a hotplate to make crispy...

7. serve with chips and salad!

8. enjoy!

[LeoB]

That sounds sensational

Cheers Leo

[Devil Ray]

That is going on the to do list

[Guest Guest123456789]

Thanks for sharing I caught my first today and have no idea how to cook it. Seems like slow cook is the go

[zmk1962]

It really depends on the size of the occy. The bigger ones will be tough(er) but the mid size ones can be quite ok with a quick stir fry. But note that generally if you cook occy (or squid) too much they will go tough...there is a sweet spot during the cooking.

My quick occy go to recipe (often served as an entree) especially if we only caught one occy....

Clean occy and remove the guts, eyes, beak etc. I generally cut off the hood and turn  it inside out. I don't skin the occy, but if you give them a generous rub of of rock salt and them wash with water you will get the slime off.

Chop the occy up into bite size pieces (remember that they will shrink a bit during cooking)

Placed the chopped pieces into a bowl, add olive oil, dash of red wine, chopped garlic, parsley, chopped chili, and fine ground white pepper to taste. (I don't add salt as it dries them out at this stage).

Let it sit in the fridge for a few hours - perhaps while you are washing down the boat!

Then whack some olive oil, chopped chili and garlic into a wok. High heat and let it sizzle but not char the garlic.

Drop in the occy, and toward the end add a bit of sesame oil (great flavour) and a dash of soy sauce (there's your salt!) and a dash of red wine. 

Stir continuously till cooked (the skin shrivels to nothing in a hot wok - just adds flavour)...your wok should be sizzling - if you have a lot of liquid and it looks like its boiling the occy then try to push the occy up on the sides of the wok and let the liquid boil down a bit. This liquid will become the drizzle for you salad.

Serve on a bed of lettuce / salad ....ok maybe some chippies on the side.

Voila Pepper chili garlic sesame oil stir fried occy !

Cheers

Zoran

 

 

[Guest Guest123456789]

Wow that looks amazing Zoran - I’ll try that next time. I simmered it in boiling water for 3 hours and it was tender but I also lost the skin/texture and a lot of flavour.

[zmk1962]

NP. Hope you enjoy the dish as well. BTW I don’t mind a bit of chewiness if the flavor is there. 

Forgot to mention the bigger tentacle suckers can have cartlidge teeth - so run the tentacles between your thumb and a knife edge to remove them before chopping. 

Cheers Z