How to cook an octopus.

Many times, we see octopuses at the grocery, frozen or not and we think it will be so difficult to cook them. It is not, in a certain way it’s also so interesting and octopus is such healthy food. During holidays we had fun cooking it.

Ingredients

Clean octopus 1 kg. = ca. 2 pounds

Water

1 teaspoon salt

Bring a pot with water to a boil.

Once it comes to a boil, take the octopus by the head, immerse the tentacles in boiling water a few seconds then bring the octopus up again

Repeat this 3 times. In this way you make sure that the meats already begin to soften.

The tentacles will become slightly curled.

If you have a small octopus, you will immediately get the “flower” effect.

Set aside the octopus

Rinse the pot, cool it, fill it with cold water and add a teaspoon of salt.

Immerse the octopus in water, make sure that it is completely covered with water, tentacles upwards, body immersed in the bottom.

Place the pot on the fire and monitor the temperature

The water will slowly begin to color and the octopus will begin to curl taking the form of a flower:

When the water reaches a temperature of 100 C° (if you do not have a thermometer you will notice it from the fact that bubbles appear) cover with a lid and from that moment calculate 10 minutes of cooking (20 for octopuses that exceed kg)

Then turn off the heat and let the octopus cook covered in its water.

From time to time (not too often otherwise you risk dispersing the heat from the pot, constantly raising the lid) turn the octopus and check the softness with the prongs of a fork.

If the water becomes cold and the octopus is not yet soft, turn on again, bring to 100 ° and then immediately turn off the heat, cover and let it cook in this way, in its water

The Octopus should cook within 50 minutes – 1 h and a half for an octopus of 500-600 gr; for larger octopuses, the cooking times are longer!

When the octopus is well tender, take it out and place it on a cutting board.

Cooked octopus has uniform, shiny skin.