benazir's blog

Fried Calimari

Here is a burning question one must ask, what is Calimari? The answer is it means squid in Italian but the Greeks eat it too. The octopus. nautilus and cuttlefish are related because they all are cephlapods which are in the mollusk family except they do not have shells. The mollusks usually are known as shell fish but these cephlapods shoot out ink at their enemy and flee as a self defence mechinism.

However I have done a couple of squid and octopus recipes which are older posts. If done right it will not be rubbery at all. You will need 1 lb or 1 kg of squid. This is for stovetop only because to air fry especially in the instant pot my over cook the calimari otherwise known as squid. What you do with your bare hands is slowly remove the tentacles from the body. It comes apart easily. look inside the tentacles and you will see its beak. Take your index finger and thumb and pinch to remove the beak.

After you do that put the tentacles in a bowl. Those are clean and now clean the body by taking the body and sticking your fingers in the cavity and remove the bone which looks like a piece of plastic. after this is removed and if you see the ink sack and this is not a problem and it will not hurt you. Some cans of squid is packed in its own ink by Goya. Cut the body in to large rings that you cut the tube in to 5 pieces and place in to a bowl and repeat until they are finished.

Rinse and add 1 clove of garlic crushed. Add either 1 pinch each of kosher salt and baking soda with 1/4 cup of water or 1 pinch each of baking powder and kosher salt, 1/4 cup of either buttermilk or milk. You can add 1 handful of nido powder milk with the water too instead and cover and let sit in the fridge for 1 hour.

Take a cast iron skillet and add 1/2 cup of either grape seed oil, corn oil, safflower oil, canola oil. vegetable oil or sunflower oil. Make sure it is on high heat and while waiting for the oil to get hot then add to the bowl with the calimari 1/2 cup of unbleached all purpose flour and 3 tbs of cornstarch. It will become like a batter and mix then use a pair of tongs add 3 Calimari rings at a time and 1 tentacle. Make sure you don’t overcook them. when they brown slightly turn and cook the other side until brown. They should be opauqe looking. Place on a plate lined with paper towel to drain. Repeat until it is finished. Drizzle with either hot sauce, wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar before serving.

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