Salt and Pepper Squid

재료

Five-Spice Mix:

1 tbsp ground ginger

1 tbsp celery powder

1 tbsp chicken stock powder

1 tbsp salt

1 tsp five-spice powder

Squid

500 g fresh whole squid

2 tbsp self-raising flour

Vegetable oil

Cornflour

Seasoning:

4 spring onions, finely sliced

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 red chilli, finely sliced

Splash of Shaosin rice wine (~½ tbsp)

방향

Five-Spice Mix:

Combine the ingredients and set aside.

Seasoning:

Put the chopped garlic, sliced chilli and spring onions into a small mixing bowl and set aside.

Squid:

Separate the head from the body by pulling them apart. Remove the transparent quill from inside the body, then cut the tentacles away from the head below the eyes, discarding the beak and eyes.

Cut the squid head into triangles, which helps the squid to curl during cooking. (see the video for how) Retain the cleaned tentacles.

Flour Mix:

Season the self-raising flour with salt and ground white pepper (approx. 1/2 tsp) in 1:1 proportion, then mix well.

In a bowl, mix the self-raising flour with 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil and a little water to make a paste. Add the squid pieces and tentacles and coat well.

In a separate bowl, mix the squid pieces with a generous quantity of cornflour, make sure there is enough cornflour to mix the pieces so that they are dry.

Frying:

Bring vegetable oil in a wok or pan to 180°C. Make sure to use enough for deep frying.

Add the squid in batches and cook until crisp. Remove with a wire basket or slotted spoon. When all the squid is cooked, drain most of the oil from the wok or pan.

Bring the wok or pan to heat again, then add the spring onions, garlic and chilli to the wok. Stir-fry for 30 seconds until aromatic.

Return the squid to the wok, add 2–3 teaspoons of five-spice mix and toss well. Pour a dash of the rice wine around the edge of the wok, toss and serve immediately.

노트

Watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v__umd7ZDk

Beware Youtube:

Youtube is full of sub-standard salt and pepper squid recipes. They include a host of unnecessary ingredients and steps like using egg and skinning and hatching the squid, which seem logical 'improvements' to home cooks but in reality are not.

Preparing Squid:

You can peel off the skin from the body and "wings" if you prefer the squid pure white but it is purely aesthetic. Squid skin has a mild, subtle flavour, essentially essence of the sea, so I never bother. The skin makes no impact to the squid's tenderness in this dish.

Same goes for cutting hatch marks on the squid. This is useful where the squid is marinated or served in a sauce, which is not the case in this recipe. You only need to do this on one side, the inside of the squid, which prevents the squid from curling too much during frying, which is not needed in this recipe.

Flours:

This recipe uses self raising flour and cornflour. However, equally good is using tapioca flour and cornflour in a 1:1 proportion for a gluten free mix. This flour mix tends to be even lighter and whiter. Simply replace the self-raising flour with this flour blend.