Baby squid: pan-grilled & fried

How feelest thou about fresh squid, with their tentacles, suckers and juices? Not that good, maybe, but you love a cajun calamari salad and those delicious crunchy rings with tangy mayonnaise… Today we bring you two step by step recipes for confident preparation of grilled and fried baby squid at home.

The good news? It’s on SASSI’s green list. 1 ingredient, 2 methods and two delicious dishes.

Your starting point is to get 250g of baby squid (with tentacles). It will be better fresh, but many deli’s also stock it frozen in which case you need to let it thaw in the fridge.

If you are aiming for 100% health the grilled squid salad is for you, and if you’re not opposed to a spot of spoiling the battered baby squid (known as Puntillitas in Spain) with chips, lemon juice and garlic mayonnaise is superb.

Baby squid salad

Ingredients | Serves 2

Marinated squid:
250g baby squid and tentacles
100ml olive oil
1 tsp chilli, finely chopped
1 tsp garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp ginger, finely chopped
Juice of 1 lemon

Salad:
1 handful bean sprouts
2 carrots, julienned
3 red salad onions, finely sliced diagonally
2 handfuls rocket
1/3 large cucumber, sliced lengthways thinly
Fresh coriander to garnish

Method

1. Mix all the ingredients together and allow the squid to marinade for no less than one hour. This can be prepared the day before and allowed to marinade overnight for the best results.
2. Combine all the salad ingredients and divide evenly into 2 bowls.
3. Grill the marinated squid in a hot pan and place on top of the salad, serve immediately, topped with fresh coriander.

Crunchy fried calamari & chips | serves 2

Ingredients

Calamari
250g baby squid and tentacles
100g flour seasoned with salt and pepper

Chips
1 ½ medium sized potatoes, julienned
1 lemon, cut into 8 wedges

[TIP: making chips and fried calamari is a whole lot easier with a deep fat fryer. We used the Morphy Richards Black Professional Stainless Steel Deep Fryer.]

Method

1. Dust the raw squid in flour, wet lightly and dip again into the seasoned flour.

2. Fry the chips once until soft, drain on paper towel
3. Fry the chips for the second time so that they soft in the inside and crispy on the outside.

4. Fry the calamari in the hot oil, take out and drain on clean paper towel. Plate the calamari and chips and serve with the lemon wedges and chive mayonnaise.

Download print-friendly recipes for Baby squid salad and Crunchy fried calamari and chips.