Do you think that exotic octopus meat has a fabulous taste only in the dishes of chefs of high-end restaurants? Don't underestimate your abilities! Believe me, everyone can cook delicious octopus at home. All you need is a little patience, skills and knowledge of a few secrets. We will tell about them further.

Only fresh!

If you are offered chilled or fresh shellfish, look for these quality indicators:

• transparent eyes (no matter how creepy it may sound);
• shiny brown skin;
• when touched, the skin remains intact;
• light fishy aroma (intense indicates staleness).

The taste of an octopus dish depends on the initial size of the clam. Large individuals (body size over 60 cm, weight over 1.5 kg) can only be handled by experienced chefs, so for home cooking it is better to take medium-sized and small mollusks. They are sold as a whole, so it's easier to choose them.

How to properly prepare frozen octopuses

Experienced chefs know how to cook frozen octopus. Without proper skills, it is better to defrost it first. After clearing the packaging, the meat is placed in a saucepan or deep bowl and thawed at room temperature.

Do not fill it with cold water to speed up the process - a lot of useful substances will slip out of the meat. Hot water should not be used - it loses its delicate taste.

When the meat is soft, it is thrown into a colander, allowed to drain, then butchered and cooked according to any fresh shellfish recipe.

How to butcher an octopus

The mollusk is a solid muscle, which is eaten. But he also has inedible organs. They must be carefully removed according to the following algorithm:

• Under running water, thoroughly rinse each tentacle, removing dirt, sand, mucus. The latter is problematic to remove from young individuals, but if it remains, the meat will become salty or bitter in taste. The mucus is scraped off with a knife or removed with a rough cloth while washing, and then each tentacle is rubbed well with salt.
• With a knife, separate the tentacles from the head just below the eyes, then remove the eyes themselves, the ink bag, and the beak. Rinse the meat again.
• It is almost impossible to immediately remove the skin, it is recommended to scald the meat with boiling water and then clean it. You can blanched in boiling acidified or salted water and peel the clam hot.
• Rinse again thoroughly, beat off and cut into small pieces.

We take parts

On sale you can also find individual octopus tentacles TM NUCHAR. Chilled or frozen - the rules for their choice remain the same. Outwardly, their skin should be shiny, brownish, without damage. If black spots, tears are visible on it, it is separated from the meat, most likely, the tentacles were stored incorrectly.

Press the tentacle and see how quickly the surface is restored - the fresh one always returns to its original state. A sharp fishy smell indicates stale meat.

Cleaning and cooking the tentacles is carried out according to the same rules as for a whole octopus. It is important to carefully beat the meat before cooking, since the large tentacles are taken from large individuals, whose meat is not as tender as that of young ones.

If you do not have time for processing, buy octopus TM NUCHAR, which is marinated in its own juice and is almost ready to eat. For cooking, the limbs are crushed: cut into circles, cubes, slices.

Grilling Octopus

Immediately after cleaning, the meat can be baked in the oven or on the grill. Small octopuses are used for this simple and quick recipe, but sliced ​​​​pieces of adults are also suitable. You will need olive oil, garlic and lemon.

Grilled octopus takes about 10 minutes to cook. Coat the meat with oil, put it on a heated grill. When it's browned, flip over to the other side. After the appearance of a gentle blush - remove.

Grilled octopus is served with a sauce of grated garlic, olive oil, squeezed lemon juice.

We cook quickly, but carefully!

Almost all recipes suggest using boiled meat. But first you need to remember: we cook the octopus only in fresh water! It actively absorbs salt, which makes it hard, almost "rubber".

Another important point in the question of how to cook the tentacles of an octopus or a whole clam: the method and time of cooking. It is only necessary to lower them into boiling water with the tentacles forward: as soon as the submerged tentacles twist, lower the mollusk completely. Depending on the size, you need to cook it for 7-10 minutes, otherwise the meat will become tough. If you miss this moment, you will have to leave it to cook for at least an hour. Ready meat is taken out and allowed to cool.

The same rule gives an answer to the question of how to cook small octopuses. The only difference is that their cooking time is minimal. Often, baby octopuses are used for salads. How to cook an octopus in this case? 800 g of cooked meat is mixed with 2-3 cloves of minced garlic, a third glass of olive oil and left in a cold place for a couple of hours. Then lettuce leaves, chopped sweet peppers, greens are laid out in a salad bowl, and pickled octopuses are covered on top. The final touch is to sprinkle the salad with lemon juice.

For cooking, you can use medium-sized clams. But then you need to cut the tentacles so that each piece has a suction cup. This makes the salad look better.

How to fry octopuses

For a fried dish, a medium-sized clam is usually taken: pre-boiled (about 5 minutes), and then cut into cubes. Separately, prepare a mixture of several cloves of garlic, lemon juice (to taste), olive oil.

This octopus recipe calls for frying chunks of meat in a hot skillet over high heat, draining off the water it releases. After that, the prepared mixture is added and fried again until all the water has evaporated (about 10–15 minutes). Before removing the meat from the heat, pepper, oregano, or any greens of your choice are added to it. The finished dish is laid out on plates and served hot.

Octopus can be stewed!

When searching for octopus dishes with photos, you must have come across incredibly mouth-watering images of amazing dishes. One of the best combinations is clam meat and beans. To prepare the dish, first soak, and then boil a glass of beans in clean water (about an hour). During this time, clam meat (2 kg) is prepared: cleaned and boiled with the addition of 1 onion and a tablespoon of vegetable oil (6 minutes).

While the beans are cooking, prepare the vegetable base in a saucepan or saucepan. In oil or lard, fry the onion (1 onion), carrots (3 medium), garlic (half of the head), chopped into circles. When they are sufficiently browned, pour in half a glass of dry white wine, olive oil (6 tablespoons) and bring to a boil. Cut the finished meat into slices and, together with the beans, put in a boiling mixture. Pepper to taste (you can use a mixture of peppers), salt, mix well and cook over low heat for another 15 minutes. Putting the dish on a plate, decorate with herbs.

Cooking young octopuses is not limited to these recipes. It is only important to properly wash, clean and boil the meat. Everything else is up to your imagination.

Octopuses in the cuisines of the world

Clam meat is familiar to the cuisines of Asia and Europe. It is used in seafood cocktails for soups, salads. The ideal companion in such mixes will be squid. Greens, vegetables, legumes, as well as wine vinegar, olive oil and soy sauce go well with octopus.

More often, the octopus is simply boiled. The Portuguese like to cook meat in batter, the Chinese pour it with all sorts of sauces, the Japanese combine it with seaweed, rice and wasabi. Italians prefer roasting and stewing, preferably with wine. Ready meat is usually served with vegetables. The most extravagant way of consumption is adopted by the Koreans - they eat shellfish alive!

Octopus. I still can’t sit down and tell about my recent acquaintance with him.

Below is a photo of how to butcher an octopus and two ways to cook an octopus.
I never held it alive in my hands, but there was a recent post in my bookmarks (yeah. In the month of August) trio_mia about this handsome man and I decided not to look for a new one, but to use exactly what was already in my favorites.

So. First you need to remove the eyes - it's simple.




The sharp knife and eyes were gone. Further "beak". It's also simple. Two incisions and it's already available for review. Such a funny one!






I should have removed the ink bag, but I couldn't find it. Well, I've looked all over and can't find it. Somewhere he was clearly hiding, because then the broth was colored!
But nevertheless, I prepared everything for cooking.


I chopped large carrots, onions, lemons, poured water and put on fire. I read “take a big pot”. Well, I got the big one... But not as big as it should be. I explain. You need a HIGH, not a wide pan, because ... all this jelly-like octopus at a high temperature comes into tone, the tentacles twist beautifully, the head (which I did not cut off) acquires a strong roundness and rises vertically. So in the water, he just simply “Standed up” with me and stood with his head above the water among the floating carrots and yellow barrels of lemon. This is where I cut off his head.




When the water boiled, I lowered the octopus there.
Well, in this way, he safely boiled for an hour on a quiet fire, after which he was left to swim in the same water until the next evening.
So the next evening, when I saw his color, I began to think that somewhere there was his ink, which I did not find. Well, nothing, I washed it from this color. Looked a little nicer. She cut off a piece. I tried. I expected that it would be quite rubbery, but no. Soft, in a pleasant tone, without a sharp taste and smell. Neutral yet recognizable taste.




I cut it into two parts and started making two recipes.
So. I had half of the octopus already cooked.
I peeled and chopped 4 potatoes.


I cut them into medium cubes and fried them to a crisp.


In the meantime, I cut the octopus,


onion, garlic clove,


a few sprigs of parsley and chopped into two pieces of dried white bread.


When the potatoes were ready, I added all the ingredients, and literally warmed them up in a pan for half a minute, salt, a mixture of 5 freshly ground peppers and a little lemon juice.


This was more than interesting. Firstly, potatoes with bread crumbs - already interesting, lightly fried parsley (this technique is somehow little used and quite recently I read in one book of the late 18th century about French cuisine that fried parsley was very much used in the then kitchen, now with the help of a microwave and food film they make chips from the leaves), the sourness of the lemon and among this the taste of the octopus was not lost.


The dish went with a bang, especially taking into account the more than fastidious taste of my sister, who does not consume half of my dishes)))
Repeat and repeat - give only an octopus)))
The other half of the octopus was left for dinner on the second day.
I marinated her.


Chopped parsley, chopped 1 clove of garlic, squeezed half a lemon, added olive oil, salt, pepper and pieces of octopus. In the container and until the evening of the next day.
It was clearly a white wine. So cold, dry and toasted slices of bread.

My conclusion is natural - everything is simpler than it seems and there are so many interesting things around that I have enough for a couple of lives and a dozen stomachs. And the octopus for me is impeccably modest and pleasantly caresses the sky with its tenderness, without bothering my jaws with long chewing.
Want an octopus? Come visit me with him. I already have 4 recipes in my bookmarks with him in the title role))))

If you still do not know how to clean and cook an octopus, then you are here.

Even the Romans and the ancient Greeks were very fond of octopuses and constantly hunted them. Love has passed through the centuries and now the inhabitants of the Mediterranean, despite all the wealth of choice, are happy to eat octopuses in any form. Salted, dried, fresh and boiled clams are useful, especially with olive oil. Octopus has a lot of protein, and besides that, they strengthen the cardiovascular system well.

Small to medium sized octopuses are usually sold whole and are easier to select. As strange as it may sound, the octopus is chosen by its eyes. They are, so to speak, a mirror of his quality. A good and edible mollusk should have transparent eyes. A large individual is butchered and on the shelves you can see only tentacles, which, of course, have no eyes. Here it is worth focusing on skin color. It should be a shiny, beautiful brown color. You can take this product without hesitation. But the octopus, which has black spots at the ends of the tentacles and those whose skin is torn, is better not to buy. They are either not fresh or not properly stored.

Octopus likes to cook in Asia and Europe. In Asian cuisine, shellfish are often simply boiled. Boiled tentacles are the basis of most salads and appetizers.

Before cooking, the tentacles are washed in water, preferably running water, then poured with cold water, and only after boiling the water is boiled for 5 to 10 minutes. The time depends on the size of the octopus. It is very important that the clam cools in the same water in which it was boiled. The cooled octopus is taken out of the container, the skin is peeled and cooked according to the recipe you like.

In Mediterranean cuisine, the ink sac is first removed from the octopus. However, it is not thrown away. Ink can also be used in many recipes. They even remove the beak and eyes. And after that, the carcass is washed in water, even beaten with an ordinary meat hammer, cut into small pieces. More often in this cuisine, octopuses are simply fried in olive oil, and then stewed with vegetables and wine.

How to cook octopus properly

The value of the octopus is the tentacles. The main thing is that they are not rubber. To do this, they can be beaten off with a meat mallet. But there is another, peaceful way. It is necessary to clearly monitor the cooking time of the products and not bring the mollusk to suffocation in boiling water. However, if time is lost, then you need to be patient and cook the octopus until it is edible. During cooking, the mollusk goes through several stages.

How to cook octopus

It is necessary to seize the moment and catch the octopus at the moment when it has not yet become stiff, or wait out this moment. There is a little trick to make the dishes excellent: during cooking, throw wine corks into the pan.

What is octopus cooked with?

Octopus is put in almost all soups that contain several types of seafood. The product goes well with squid. And now many cooks make cutlets from these mollusks. By the way, kids love to eat this dish. Here it is important to remove the beaks from the squid and octopus, gut and pass through a meat grinder. Add garlic, herbs and onions to the minced meat, then roll in breadcrumbs and fry.

Cooking young octopuses

It is enough to keep the cutlets in the pan for two to three minutes. By the way, such dishes are very useful for artists. Octopuses and squids are pure protein, and it is useful for ligaments and allows you to keep your voice for a long time. No wonder the best singers are Italians, who eat seafood almost every day.

What else goes well with an octopus dish?

Any legumes, for example, beans, vegetables, herbs and, of course, soy sauce or olive oil, wine vinegar.

The Japanese serve octopus with rice, seaweed and wasabi. The Chinese are wise and mask the mollusk with sauces. The Portuguese prefer battered octopus, while the Italians prefer to put it in soup for broth.

You can also eat octopus alive. At least that's how Koreans like to do it. But in Russia it is advised to make salads with octopuses. They are light and nutritious at the same time. You can safely put lettuce leaves in a salad, add olive oil or wine vinegar, lemon. But the main thing is not to overdo it. For salad and sashimi, appearance is always important. Therefore, you need to try to cut the tentacles beautifully. Make sure that each belt or circle has a suction cup.

Popular Octopus Recipes

Octopus Feijoada (Portuguese Cuisine)

For this dish you will need 1.5 kg of octopus, 1 cup of beans, 5 cloves of garlic, 5 tbsp. olive oil, 2 tbsp. melted lard, 4 onions, salt, parsley and black pepper, 3 medium carrots and half a glass of dry white wine.

Beans must be soaked for a day or two, dried and boiled over low heat. Cut boiled (with onion and olive oil) octopus. Saute chopped garlic in olive oil and lard in a saucepan. Next, add chopped onion, and sliced ​​​​carrots. Season all this with salt, pepper and continue to simmer. Add white wine and bring the dish to a boil.

And then put the chopped octopus and beans. Add water, add salt and pepper. Cook over low heat. After it is worth taking out a few tablespoons of the beans, crush it with a fork and put it back. Stir and simmer until thickened. Sprinkle with chopped parsley before serving.

Fried octopus (Maltese cuisine)

For the dish you will need 0.5 kg of octopus, 2 tbsp. vegetable oil, 4 pcs. onions, 2 tbsp. tomato paste, 8 pcs. olives, 1 tbsp. capers, 1 tbsp. chopped mint, 1 tsp spice mix and 1 glass of red wine.

First of all, you need to remove the eyes and the ink bag from the octopus. Rinse the carcass under running water. Break off and cut into pieces. Brown the onion in oil, add the octopus to it and fry for a few minutes. Then add all other ingredients and simmer for two hours. Stir occasionally. It is necessary to ensure that the meat does not dry out and add hot water. This octopus can be served with potatoes or spaghetti. Garnish should be added at the end of cooking.

Octopus salad (Cypriot cuisine)

Take 300 gr. Octopus, 1.5 liters of water, 1 tsp. salt, 1-2 onions, 2-3 tomatoes, 2 tbsp. chopped parsley, 2 green onion leaves, 90 g. Green olives, 2 tbsp. capers, 4 tbsp. lemon juice, half tbsp. sugar and 2 tbsp olive oil.

Cut the octopus, remove its beak and boil for 40-50 minutes in salted water. After this, dry the clam. At this time, peel the tomatoes from the skin and cut. At the same time, chop the onion, and add green onion and parsley. Mix well. In a separate container, mix oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Dress the salad with the resulting mixture. It can be served with bread with butter.

Fried baby octopuses

Yesterday I stopped by on business in Jaffa, I looked into the fish shop. And what was my surprise when on the counter, I saw small octopuses, though slightly frozen. I never thought that I could meet this in Israel. Buying squid here is not a problem, but octopuses! I decided to buy them, since such luck itself went into my hands. And I'll cook fried octopuses!

What will I need:
500 gr small octopuses
2 tbsp olive oil
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tbsp multi-colored peppercorns
2-4 small red chili peppers finely chopped
1 tbsp fish sauce.

1. First of all, the octopuses must be cleaned. To do this, I took a small sharp knife and removed the insides.

The entrails are located in the head area, in order to remove them you need to either cut off the head or make a slit and clean out all the contents well.
Next, remove the beak. I took the carcass, parted the beak with my index finger and removed it.

Then I threw it away, they don't need it anymore. I carefully wash the carcasses and make cuts on the head in 2 or 3 places. Everything, processing is completed. I put the peeled carcasses in a shallow dish.

2. Cooking octopuses for frying. To do this, put the octopus, oil, garlic, peppercorns and chili in a bowl and marinate for 30 minutes. I heat up a very flat barbecue pan or you can take, if available, cast iron.

Fry 3 octopuses at a time, turning frequently, for 3 minutes or until they turn white.

Be careful not to overcook! The first batch is ready, I sprinkle it with fish sauce and squeezed lime juice. I put it on the table right away. If desired, you can decorate the dish with sprigs of cilantro (coriander) or a few slices of pepper.

This recipe can also be used to cook squid. To do this, wash the carcasses, dry and cut into squares or strips. Cook them the same way you cook octopuses, just don't overcook them or they'll be tough.

Whole body octopus is one big muscle. For this reason, to make the meat soft and tender, octopus preparation requires a special procedure.

So we have fresh octopus. It should be firm-fleshed and have a slight fishy smell, its skin should be brown and shiny, and the white part of the eye should certainly be large and transparent (usually better cook octopus about a kilogram in weight, they have more tender meat). octopus wash well under running water, going over each tentacle to remove any residue that might remain in them, remove the insides. Thoroughly clean the head and wash well inside and out.

Preparing the octopus

Under the skin octopus there is a complex structure of the muscular membrane, consisting of five layers of muscle fibers that overlap with each other. The strength of the tissues is ensured by a tight fit and complex interweaving of the structural elements of the muscles, and during cooking, these muscles contract. There are two ways to avoid this.

First way lies in freezing octopus before cooking (to soften the octopus, you can beat it off, but freezing is more effective). Put clean octopus in the freezer and leave for at least 24 hours (preferably 2-3 days). Octopus contains enough water and it, turning into ice, tending to expand, breaks the nerves and fibers. To thaw, just leave octopus in the refrigerator (in the same way defrost octopus, if you bought it already frozen, so it is advisable to buy a day earlier, at least).

Second way probably the most famous is " scare the octopus". How to scare an octopus? It is necessary to quickly, holding the octopus by the head, about five or six times, lower it into boiling water and only then finally lower it into the water and boil. Due to a sharp temperature drop, collagen (the basis of the connective tissue of the body) is destroyed and the result is softer and more tender meat (when heated, collagen has the property of denaturation, the triple helix unwinds, the chains separate, then, when the denatured mass of tangled chains cools, it absorbs all the surrounding water, forming gelatin).

Cooked octopus

Always boil the octopus in a large wide saucepan so that it is completely covered with water, without salt, with the addition of bay leaf, onion, garlic clove (do not peel, just crush with a knife), cloves and peppercorns, which will provide a rich taste octopus(although this is not required).

As soon as the water boils, "scare" the octopus and cook it together with potatoes (put a medium potato on 1.5 kg of octopus).

When the potatoes are cooked, turn off the heat and leave the octopus in the water for about 25 minutes. To test for doneness, you can pierce the top of the tentacle with a fork, and if the fork goes in easily, the octopus is done. Remove it from the water.

Final preparation of the octopus

Now we need to finish cleaning. Cut off the part of the body with the head between the bag and the tentacles and discard. Squeeze out and cut out the chewing organ of the octopus, located between the tentacles.

The octopus is one big muscle. The larger the octopus, the tougher the meat. To make the meat of this cephalopod soft, juicy and tender, it must be properly cleaned and prepared.

Instruction

Fresh octopus should be firm-fleshed, have a marine fishy odor, skin color should be brown, and the whites of the eyes should be clear and white. It is recommended to purchase octopuses weighing up to a kilogram, they have more tender and soft meat.

Rinse octopus under a stream of running water, go over each tentacle, remove all sand and residual dirt.

Cut off the head just below the eyes, remove the tentacles, set them aside. Cut off the eyes, use a knife to clean the cavity of the carcass. Squeeze out the beak with force, cut it out and discard. Rinse the head, cleaned from the insides, inside and out.

Skin from fresh octopus very difficult to remove. Therefore, cooks most often leave it until they heat it. If you still want to skin, boil octopus in water for 5-10 minutes, cool it, and then remove the skin from the cold carcass.

Now octopus can be cooked or frozen for storage. Experienced chefs recommend always freezing the carcass octopus before, it essentially softens the tough muscle meat. Put the cleansed octopus in the freezer and leave for at least a day, but better for 2-3 days. Water contained in the muscle structure octopus, turning into ice, will expand, tearing the nerves and hard fibers. To unfreeze octopus, it is enough to place it in the refrigerator for 6-10 hours.

From octopus you can cook a huge number of dishes. This meat goes great with onions, garlic, tomatoes, lemon, olive oil, rice, wine and soy sauce. Octopus is not only great in salads, it's great as a main dish. For example, try to cook a barbecue from octopus or stew it in red wine.

note

Octopuses are very helpful. Properly cooked octopus meat is a source of calcium, magnesium, sodium, zinc, copper, manganese, potassium, phosphorus, iron, selenium and a huge amount of vitamins.