PULPO CON PATATAS

I remember this old D&G TV ad, supposedly set in Sicily: the usual Big-Jim-look-alike kind of guy that you see in all D&G ads captures an octopus while swimming, then comes back to the beach and kills the animal smashing it on a rock. Then he checks out a nearby Monica Bellucci who at that precise moment is putting on a swimsuit, with two old Sicilian women helping to hide her naked body; Monica and Big Jim exchange a glance, then she jumps into the water and he starts eating the octopus raw, right there.

Now, I am not sure if this scene really succeeds in appearing sort of sexy, I suspect that for example an English viewer (who most likely wouldn't even think of cephalopodes as edible things) will just find it weird. However, it's true and historically accurate that octopus is a traditional delicacy not only in Sicily but in pretty much the whole of Italy. And as a matter of fact, this is another food that the Italian and Iberian peninsulas have in common, as in Spain and Portugal octopus is very popular too. 

The most common version around here is definitely pulpo a la Gallega (roughly "octopus in the Galician way"), which means that the octopus is boiled and accompanied by thinly sliced potatoes, pimentón dulce (paprika), good olive oil, coarse salt. Simple but effective, as all ingredients come together nicely. The recipe originated in Galicia, like the name suggests, but it is now spread pretty much everywhere in the country, and it is very easy to find in Madrid venues.

Personally I love octopus, especially with potatoes, but when I am home I tend to prepare it differently from the orthodox a la Gallega version, just to have a bit of variety. My usual recipe is actually more similar to a Portuguese dish called polvo à Lagareiro, where the octopus is first boiled and then grilled.

A word on octopus

You could easily find pre-cooked octopus at markets/supermarkets, but then you would lose all the fun of cooking it, and you wouldn't have control over the degree of chewieness that you want for the final product, and it would be way more expensive...  Buy raw instead, it will cost you usually less than 10 euros per kilo and the dirty job of cleaning will be already taken care of by the fishmonger. The only small steps left for you to do are fairly easy: remove the eyes, the beak and the ink sac with the help of a sharp knife or scissors. That's it.

But, before starting with the actual cooking, you should know about the classic problem with octopus, the fact that it tends to become rather chewie after it's been boiled. There are a few tricks you can use in order to improve its tenderness:

*You can buy the octopus a few days in advance, then simply freeze it. The water inside it will turn into ice and expand, supposedly breaking the tissues and making the defrosted pulpo more tender.

*You can "scare" the octopus. This is a traditional solution, and you can actually see it done live in traditional ferias Gallegas (Galician fairs), where cooks seem to be constantly throwing octopi around, in and out of boiling water. Basically, you don't just throw the mollusk in boiling water then forget about it; rather, you grab it by the head then put it in boiling water for a few seconds, then pull it out; then put it in again, then pull it out; then put it in for the final time, and leave it there to cook. It should have something to do with the octopus flesh (is it called "flesh", I wonder? "meat" sounds wrong...) gradually getting used to the high temperature, and staying tender because of this. Similarly, some Italian recipes suggest to put the octopus in cold water and then slowly heat the whole thing together (and this is more or less what I do).

*You can also beat the octopus repeatedly with a meat mallet. If you do this, remember to cover it with some film or you'll be splashing water all over the place.

Last thing before starting: don't add any salt to the boiling water, at least not from the start. The octopus is already soaked in salty water, that will be released during the cooking, giving flavor to the broth.

Ingredients for 4:

1 octopus of 1,5 or 2 kgs

1 kg of potatoes

extra-virgin olive oil (you'll need quite a lot of it, some 10 tablespoons)

half a glass of white wine for cooking

1 clove of garlic

1 laurel leaf

some parsley

some rosemary

some thyme

coarse salt

Remove eyes/beak/ink sac from the octopus. Now it's the moment: if you feel brave, take a good bite and then let me know if it tastes good.

If you don't feel brave, put 4 tablespoons of oil, the laurel, chopped garlic and chopped parsley in a big pan - or, if you have it, in a pressure cooker. Fry on low heat for a couple of minutes, then add the octopus. Shake the pan a bit, pour in the white wine, let it evaporate a bit, then add cold water until you cover the octopus almost completely. Cover the pan with a lid and let it cook on low heat for something like 40 minutes from the moment it boils. In the meantime, peel the potatoes and cut them in rather big chunks.

Note that the cooking time might actually vary depend on the size of the octopus, and on how tender you want it to be: many prefer a final product that is a bit chewie, rather than something cooked for so long that it almost falls apart. In any case you can always stick a fork into it to check on its tenderness. Also, if you are using a pressure cooker you can reduce the cooking time by half.

When you are satisfied with the tenderness of the octopus, take it out of the pan and leave it alone for 15 minutes, so the skin doesn't fall off. In the meantime, taste the broth left in the pan - it should be very flavorful, as the octopus during cooking has released juices and salty water; add salt only if needed, then throw in the potatoes. Boil them for 10 minutes or so.

Switch on the oven, set it to grill-200º. Prepare a large oven dish, sprinkle some oil on it, some thyme and some rosemary. After the 10 mins have passed, remove the potatoes from the broth and transfer them to the oven dish. Cut the octopus into pieces, then add it to the oven dish. Sprinkle with oil, add some coarse salt and put the dish in the oven for 10 or 15 mins, close to the grill. Once potatoes and octopus have a color that you like, take them out, add some more olive oil if you like it, and serve.

By the way, after all this you will still have the excellent broth that you used to cook the pulpo and the potatoes: save it for some nice soup or fishy preparations. You can also freeze it.

REAL GOOD FRIES

Madrileños must like crisps. If you take a walk in pretty much any of Madrid's neighborhoods, you will soon come across one of those frutos secos shops, with a giant wall of crisps showing off from the shop's window:




It's usually good stuff, try them if you have the chance.

Things get more difficult if you are looking for a good portion of French fries, though. Proper fries for me (for everybody, I guess) should be soft on the inside and crispy-crunchy on the outside; also, the REAL GOOD fries, the ones that you can find for example in Belgium, sold by incospicuous street stalls, tend to be rather big: not the frozen thin parallelepipeds from supermarkets, nor the meh little thingies of Burger King/Mac, but big, luxurious potato wedges.

Unfortunately the fries you can find in Madrid's bars tend to be limp.
Limp fries=nono. I looked for venues where to get good ones, and I found out there is a pretty little Belgian place right next to Plaza Mayor, it's called Cafeeke (which means "little café" in Flemish, I am told). It's pretty good, with nice atmosphere, old dark wood furniture, many great beers and street food that Dutchmen and Belgians love, like frikandel... Some other time I'll talk about it in detail, here I just wanted to note that even the fries sold there are not REAL GOOD fries. They are certainly very good, better than Madrid average; but they don't reach The Belgian Excellence in my opinion, at least because of the size. Besides they are expensive, 4.50 for fries is not fair price.*

So in the end I decided to try making them at home. After some research and a good amount of experiments, here is where I stand.

Basic principles of Belgian fries

Learning to fry
The general consensus is: if you want them crispy, you need to fry the potatoes twice; first at low temperature and for a fairly long time, then at high temperature for a short time. In between the two fryings you have to let the potatoes rest - or sweat, like someone says - for a while.

(obviously I am assuming you are starting from fresh, uncooked potatoes. The frozen packets you buy at the supermarket already went through the first phase, which is why you can fry them for a few minutes and they are ready; by the way, even using those the final result is crunchier than the average stuff you find in Madrid's bars :))

Now, you might be asking: ok, at what temperature exactly should I fry the potatoes then? and for how long?

It depends. If you google it, you'll see that different sources give different numbers: could be

130º for 5 mins/15 mins rest/160º for 2 and a half mins

or

160º for 6 mins/30 mins rest/180º for 2 mins

or many other combinations; the time of the first frying can go up to 10 mins or more. Some even say you should fry the potatoes 3 times for best results. Heston Blumenthal as usual describes a hardcore procedure: 10 mins boiling followed by some resting time in the fridge, then first frying, then more resting time, then second frying (kind of long, but your fries are supposed to be perfect at the end of all this).

My impression is that temperature and especially cooking time can vary depending on the size of the potato pieces you have cut. Bigger fries need more time. Below I will give you the numbers I usually apply, but I guess some trial and error on your side might be unavoidable.

Agua
Another variable that can affect crispyness is the amount of water present in the potato: more water means more chances to have soggy fries. This has a few consequences:

*The variety of the potatoes you are using can be important. Buy "patatas para freír" at the supermarket, supposedly they contain less water.

*If you wash the potatoes after peeling them, remember to pat them dry. This will also prevent the oil from doing funny stuff when you throw the potatoes in.

*There is a size limit: if the fries are too big, they'll retain too much water and always end up limp. I would not go past 1 cm thickness when cutting the potatoes.

Oil
I use olive oil (aceite de oliva sabor suave). I don't think it's worth using extravirgen, as it doesn't give better results besides being more expensive - and less heat-resistant, according to some people. By the way, I plan to write a post soon about the types of oil commonly used in frying.

Deep fryer or pan?
Well, a deep fryer (freidora) allows you to set the temperature of the oil, so obviously it makes things much easier. You can also use a thermometer like this, that's even more precise. If you only use a pan, again you might have to go through some trial and error before getting things right, but you will have wonderful results just the same.

What is starch again?
I read somewhere that it's a good idea to soak potatoes in cold water for half an hour or so before frying them (or alternatively keep them under running water for a while). By doing that, I believe you are doing some stuff to the starch inside the potato (I have no idea of what, exactly) and the final result is supposed to be more crunchy. If you want to give it a try, go for it, just remember to pat them dry once you are done.

My way
Here is how I do it. I peel a lot of those patatas para freír (because you can never have enough fries), trying to pick the ones that have roughly the same size. I wash them quickly in cold water, then carefully pat them dry. I cut them in pieces more or less of the same size: my standard fry is about 7 or 8 mm thick (precision is everything :)), or in any case thicker than 5 mm and less thick than 1 cm.

I put oil in the freidora. I put the soon-to-be fries in the bucket of the freidora, without overloading it (I cook them in batches if I have a lot - I usually do). I set the temperature at 150º, then fry the potatoes for 8 minutes. They should not yet gain a golden color at this stage, or maybe just a little bit; if they do get a lot of color, the oil temperature is too high.

[Alternatively, when I don't have a freidora, I put a lot of oil in a deep pan, and I heat it. From the start I throw in a piece of old bread: according to my mother, this prevents the oil from burning:), and also it tells you when the oil is ready, as you will see the usual little bubbles that the frying oil creates around the bread. Throw in the potatoes when the oil is still not very hot, i.e. when there are few bubbles around the bread. Keep the heat on low or medium low for the whole 8 minutes, and remember the fries should just start to get a little bit of color at this stage, but no more than that.]

In the meantime, I put some oven paper on a flat, heat resistent surface that I don't mind staining with oil - could be the oven tray, for example. After 8 minutes, I remove the fries from the oil and distribute them on the oven paper. They should not touch each other, and they should rest for approximately half an hour. I generally use this time to fry a second batch (also this second batch will need to rest somewhere for half an hour, of course).

I prepare some kitchen paper in a deep plate, for when the fries will be ready. After half an hour, I heat up the oil again, this time to 190º.

[When I don't have a freidora, I just heat up the oil until there are a lot of bubbles around the piece of bread, and during the frying itself I keep the heat on high.]

I throw the potatoes in, and I fry them until they have a color I like; it usually takes no more than a couple of minutes, so better keep an eye on them to avoid burning. I take them out, I drop them in the plate with the kitchen paper, and voilà! Proper fries.


*I like alliterations :)