RECIPES - Spaghetti di Gragnano I.G.P. with slow cooked octopus, red radicchio sauce, grilled octopus tentacle and lime zest

I recently bought a roner to be able to cook sous vide and when I first cooked the octopus I was pleasantly surprised about how good, tender, and tasty it was. 

For this recipe, you can either get one (you can find some very affordable on the market that just works very well for our purpose) or you can cook it old style, the tenderness and taste will be slightly different but you can achieve good results too.

Ingredients for serving 4 people:

For the slow-cooked octopus

half octopus
chives
parsley
2 limes
Madagascar pepper

Cut the tentacles and place them in sous vide bag, add the chives, parsley, Madagascar pepper, and half lime.

Sous vide and cook at 85 degrees for 3.30 hours.

The tentacles will shrink releasing a nice juice you will use later.

Open the bag, keep the juice, and separate the tentacles from the spices and herbs.

Cut each tentacle in 1 cm wide chunks starting from the thickest part, stop once reaching the middle leaving intact about ten cm of the thinner part.

Put everything aside.

For the red radicchio sauce

red radicchio from Chioggia
extra virgin olive oil 
½ glass of red wine
salt

Wash the radicchio leaves and cut the white hard part in the middle.

In a saucepan warm the olive oil and add the finely chopped radicchio leaves and when getting darker and tender add the red wine, let it evaporate and adjust of salt. 

Don’t let it dry too much as it needs to be moisture. 

Put everything in a tall container and blend until nice and smooth.

For the spaghetti di Gragnano I.G.P. with octopus

400gr spaghetti di Graganano I.G.P.
1 garlic clove
extra virgin olive oil
octopus chunk from above recipes
parsley
salt
pepper

Bring abundant salted water to boil, dive in the spaghetti and cook them for the indicated time, usually is about 18/20 minutes.

In a saucepan warm the oil, add a piece of garlic, and cook until golden.

Toss in the chunks of octopus, let it warm and add a glass of juice from the sous vide bag.

Let it evaporate till the sauce gets thicker but not too dry. Adjust of salt.

Once the pasta is cooked, drain the water and put them in the saucepan, toss in the finely chopped parsley and stir vigorously.

For the grilled octopus tentacles

octopus tentacles from the above recipes
extra virgin olive oil
white pepper
salt
1 lime

Once the pasta is almost done take the octopus tentacles you left behind and rub in olive oil.

Grill them at high heat till makes a little crust, as they are cooked already it will take just a minute. Seasoning with salt, white pepper, and squeezed lime.

Presentation (one portion)

Lime zest

Take a round plate and pour in the middle one full spoon of red radicchio sauce.

Using the back of it beat the center to create the splash effect.

Place a large ring in the middle, add one more spoon of sauce and place the spaghetti on top.

Remove the ring, grate lime zest all around the plate and place on top the grilled tentacle.

Wine pairing:

Trentino D.O.C. Pinot Grigio Pietramontis - Villa Corniole