Friday 25 May 2007

The Octopus Story: Episode 1


We normally get our share of fresh Frutti di Mare
every Friday in our weekly market sold by a team
of Dutch fish vendors. They are Protestant in
their religious preference, I should say but they
help me keep my Catholic upbringing by buying fresh
tuna, dorade, shrimps, sardines, salmon, mussels,
clams, squids and octopus and thus make me vegetarian
at least every Friday and not only on Holy Friday.
Not that I buy all the above Frutti di Mare in their
stall every Friday but at least I have enough seafood
supply without having to live near the sea.
In short, I am a Suki, or I consider them my fish Suki
and I can proudly say that I have invested a bit in making
their fish business flourish.
After one sojourn in Padova where I tasted this freshly
prepared Pulpo or Octopus salad in a market stand in the
city center, I have always wished making my own fresh
octopus salad. So returning one day to my favorite fish
vendor, I eagerly got me one fresh Octopus...well fresh
in the sense, it was freshly lying on a mount of crushed ice.

Home with my prized Octopus, I prepared a potful of
water with cut onions, pieces of garlic, black peppers and
salt and put the whole octopus to cook while I looked for
the phone to start another hobby. In between calls, I wanted
to check the stuff when I saw a chicken-like structure floating
out of the pot. Madonna! The octopus had doubled in size and
was about to jump out of the boiling broth. Where did I see
such film, I was wondering...tentacles or what? Our late lunch
was delayed more by my excitement as I called back the phone
mate to narrate my first Pulpo cooking experience. Are
they also doping octopus nowadays?
Taste of the warm octopus salad: A bit "gummy" but the olive
oil imported from an Italian supermarket saved the late lunch.

To be continued: Abangan ang susunod na kabanata!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hallo!
nun steht Pfingsten vor der Tür und ich bin gespannt ob in deinen blogspots Pfingstrosen oder Pfingstochsen auftauchen werden.

Ich habe noch nie Octopus gekocht,wenn ich auf dem Markt einen finden probiere ich den Rezept aus,
schöne Grüße an den "Leihvater" und
frohe Pfingsten wünscht Euch
Heide

Pinay von Alemanya said...

Ja, Good idea! Will look for the roses...

Anonymous said...

und vielleicht triffst du unterwegs
einen Pfingstochsen, jemanden der
zu bunt gekleidet ist, z.B.
wie Gildo Horn.

Heide

Anonymous said...

Ako ang nainggit Ms Bituingmarikit. Kahit na takai desu mukha talagng napakasarap. Talking of networking, who knows a similar place like this in the Cologne area? yz