Octopus Salad with Blood Orange

Octopus Salad with Blood Orange

The core of this salad is sliced boiled octopus and thinly sliced celery.  The rest of the ingredients are versatile. You can add grated carrots, boiled cubed potatoes, olives and so forth. But the seasoning on the other hand is what makes a difference.

Serves four:

• 1 medium octopus 1-1.5 kg in weight (a frozen one works just as well) 
• 1 onion
• 1 small celery stick
• small carrot, grated or finely  chopped (optional)
• 2 boiled, peeled potatoes and cut into smaller segments (optional)
• salt
• a few tablespoons of olive oil
• freshly squeezed juice from one blood orange
• freshly ground black pepper
• flaky sea salt

For the garnish:

• a few parsley leaves
• chilli flakes (optional)
• peeled blood orange and cut into smaller pieces

Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil. Place the octopus into the pot along with the peeled onion and simmer on a medium to low heat until tender enough to push a small sharp knife easily through the the thickest part of the flesh. Depending on the size of your octopus it should take between 40 minutes to 1 hour.

Remove the octopus from the cooking water and let it cool.

Slice or cut the cooled octopus into chunks and arrange it on a serving plate along with the sliced celery stick. Now add any other ingredients you wish to choose: boiled potatoes, olives, capers, carrot and so forth.

Season with flaky sea salt and some grated black pepper. Now drizzle the olive oil and fresh blood orange juice over your salad, decorate with a few parsley leaves and enjoy!