Turtle-and-starfish Bow Tie o’ the Day is as eager as I am to expand my palate. The other day, I mentioned I picked up octopus salad at Dick’s Market while I was buying my usual squid salad. The store had never carried octopus salad before, so I just had to bring some home to give it a try. Thankfully, the salad is not made with bigly octopi. Those would be hard to swallow. So I guess that means the salad is made with baby octopi. Sorry, baby sea creatures.
Whenever I fix a dinner entrée for the first time, I always ask Suzanne if it’s a do-over– meaning, does she like it enough to want me to make it again. With that rating in mind, I declare this particular recipe of octopus salad to be a do-over. I would eat it again. Octopus does not taste like chicken (ha, ha, ha). Actually, it tastes almost exactly like the Dick’s squid salad I regularly eat.
While the main ingredient in each of these salads is the sea creature meats, tons of sliced ginger in each salad creates a perfect zippy flavor. Really, the only significant difference I found between the squid salad and the octopus salad was that octopi are chewier. Significantly chewier. I think I had to chew one of the octopi for at least three minutes before it was safely swallowable. They should use octopi to make chewing gum.
The only meat I’ve ever eaten which I would categorize as chewier than octopus is alligator. Yes, I once ate a dish called alligator-on-a-stick, at the Utah Arts Festival in 1987. Alligator is one tough meat, even if it’s skewered and barbecued and sold by a street vendor.
Tasting octopus salad was a teeny adventure. It wasn’t a huge deal, and I didn’t cringe about it or have to muster my courage. It wasn’t on my bucket list (which I don’t really have). In the scheme of things, it was a blip of a new thing to try. But I’m glad I did it. Doing it added a new story to my life. It changed me, ever so slightly. Small forays into the unknown add up to an interesting-er life, I think. The opportunities for tiny adventures are all around you, every day. All you have to do is pay attention to whatever’s sitting by the squid salad.