This has always been my go-to snack whenever I wanted something to pair with my fruit juice or even better a cold beer. It’ll take you literally under 30 minutes to pull everything together, as long as you have the Cajun sauce base whipped up ahead of time. Speaking of Cajun, this semi-dried squid is using the Cajun seasoning mixture from this delicious Garlic Cajun Boiling Seafood. I’ve been using this Cajun sauce recipe in the restaurant I worked at for years and people loved it. You will not be disappointed at all, I promise, so why don’t you give it a try?
One thing that I learnt from commercial kitchen is you should always prep your most complicated sauce in advance, refrigerate or freeze it, so by the time you want to cook the desired dish; it’ll only take a blink of an eye to finish. I would suggest you to make this Cajun mix ahead of time, this can be refrigerated for up to 1 month, even beyond that. The sauce is made of butter and a whole bunch of spices which make it impossible to go bad rapidly.
Cajun Style Semi-dried Squid
I normally use semi-dried squid or 1-sun-dried squid (mực một nắng) for this recipe, but regular fresh squid works just fine too.
Ingredients
- 1 medium semi-dried squid (mực một nắng) OR
- 1 medium fresh squid
- corn kernels as needed
- basil leaves as needed
- Vietnamese coriander as needed
- unsalted butter as needed
- jalapeno optional, as needed
Cajun seasoning mixture
- 7 oz garlic minced
- 0.5 oz Cajun seasoning
- 0.5 oz Old Bay seasoning
- 0.5 oz paprika
- 0.4 oz brown sugar
- 0.2 oz cayenned pepper or more if needed
Instructions
- You can make cajun sauce ahead of time: In a medium cooking pan, melt unsalted butter over medium heat. When butter has melted completely, add the minced garlic and saute for 5 minutes. Be careful, DO NOT burn the garlic. Add the rest of seasoning mixture to the melted butter, constantly stir for another 5-8 minutes. Set the sauce aside.
- Pre-heat oven to 200C/390F.
- Grill semi-dried squid (mực một nắng) or fresh squid for 10-15 minutes. The squid is done when one-third of its length starts curling toward the mid line.
- Remove grilled squid from the oven. Carefully cut into small pieces diagonally.
- In a medium pan, melt butter, add corn kernel, stir evenly. When the corn is half way done, add grilled squid.
- Gradually add 1 tbsp of Cajun sauce at a time. It depends on your flavor profile, you decide how much sauce to put in.
- Give the pan a few shakes to make sure corn and grilled squid are coated well with Cajun sauce.
- Serve immediately. Garnish with basil, Vietnamese coriander (rau răm) and/or jalapeno slices.
- Enjoy!
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