Every year on Christmas Eve we have a Feast Of The Seven Fishes. We’re not of Italian descent, but our mother believed in celebrating every holiday that had good food.

We’ve previously shared some our past menus:

 
This year we’re adding a new dish to our feast repertoire: fried squid (calamari). Why such a basic preparation?

We love cornmeal-crusted fried calamari. Sadly, we haven’t seen it on a restaurant menu in several years. Even eateries that are more creative with their food use all-purpose flour.

So, much as we’re not keen on deep frying in our apartment kitchen with no exhaust fan, we’re jonesing for some cornmeal.

Our favorite flour for frying is cornmeal; our favorite breadcrumbs are panko, which we use instead of the fresh breadcrumbs in the original recipe. We also use the cornmeal-panko combination for fried chicken.

If you have corn flour instead of cornmeal, use it. The difference is that corn flour is ground to a much finer texture than cornmeal.

RECIPE: CORNMEAL CRUSTED FRIED SQUID

Ingredients 6 Servings

 
Before you start preparation, here are two important tips from the Sydney Fish Market to fry superior squid:

Top photo courtesy Sydney Fish Market. Middle photo courtesy CB Crabcakes. Bottom photo courtesy Bull & Bear.

 
Preparation

1. SLICE the squid tubes into two or three sections, turn them inside out and wipe firmly with a clean, damp cloth to remove any membrane. Then slice into rings. Cut the tentacles (a delicacy we love!) in half.

2. SEASON the flour well with salt and pepper and place in a bowl. Place the eggs in another bowl and the breadcrumbs in a third bowl.

3. DUST squid in flour, shaking off any excess. Then dip into the egg, drain well and coat in breadcrumbs. Place on a plate, cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

4. HEAT the oil oil in a wok or deep-fryer to 360°F/180°C. Deep-fry squid in batches, for 1-2 minutes, until golden and crisp (frying for more than two minutes will toughen the squid). Drain on paper towels. Cool the oil between batches; skim it to remove any loose crumbs.

5. SPRINKLE the cooked squid with salt and optional parsley, and serve with lemon wedges.
 
 
MAKE FRESH BREADCRUMBS

1. PULSE day-old (or stale) bread in a food processor until finely crumbed.

2. STORE in an airtight container in the freezer to use whenever breadcrumbs are required. You can mix crumbs from different types of bread, and always have a crumbs on hand while finding a good use for old bread.

Top photo: Don’t discard the tentacles;
they’re delicious. If you don’t want to fry
them, save them and blanch them later.
Photo courtesy Ultimate-guide-to-greek-
food.com/.

In The Beginning: Taxonomy

While “calamari” has become a culinary term that encompasses calamari, squid and even cuttlefish, they are “different species,” as the popular term goes. Literally, they are in different orders; and below the order level are hundreds of genuses of “squid” worldwide, differing in size, skin color and other features.

If your eyes are starting to glaze over, skip to the next section, “The Source Of The Confusion.” Otherwise, soldier on:

One step down from the top taxonomy, Kingdom (here Animalia) is the phylum Mollusca.

Remember your high school biology? After kingdom and phylum comes class, and there are two tasty ones that comprise most of the seafood we eat. Squid and calamari are members of Cephalopoda class; clams, geoducks, mussels, oysters and scallops are in the class Bivalvia. Lobsters, shrimp and other crustaceans differ one level up, at the phylum levele Arthropoda.

Squid, calamari and cuttlefish are known as cephalopods, mollusks that have lost their hard shells in the evolutionary process. They are members of the class Cephalopoda and subclass Coleoidea. The Coleoidea subclass also includes octopus. They then fall into different families, then species, then genuses within the species.

After Class is the Order level, where there is a parting of ways: squid and calamari to the order Teuthida and cuttlefish to the order Sepiida. Food geeks who want to know more can check out the full taxonomy.

Treat cephalopods with the respect they deserve: Scientists believe that the ancestors of modern cephalopods diverged from the primitive, externally-shelled Nautilus (Nautiloidea) some 438 million years ago. This was before there were fish in the ocean, before the first mammals appeared on land, before vertebrates crawled from the sea onto land, and even before Earth had upright plants.

Cephalopods were once one of the dominant life forms in the world’s oceans. Today there are only about 800 living species of cephalopods, compared with 30,000 species of bony fish. [Source]

Calamari are plentiful in the Mediterranean Sea; Italians call the live and cooked versions calamari (the singular is calamaro). Since most people in English-speaking countries first encountered dishes called calamari in Italian restaurants, the word is used interchangeably.

Truth to tell, Italian restaurants in America may well have been selling squid. Wholesalers and retailers blur the lines. Given the scientific complexities, it’s best to let this one lie and use the words interchangeably. Most people couldn’t tell the difference once they’re cleaned and cooked.

However, if you’re buying raw squid/calamari, you can tell the two apart by the fins:

 
Yes, it’s that simple.