May 8, 2014 4 min read

While I call this space I’m lucky enough to have “The Family Table,” we parents like to treat ourselves to kid-free time and cook creatively – without worrying that something will be too spicy/weird tasting, or that we’re going to screw up dinner for more than just ourselves.

More often than not, we swing for the fences and do relatively well. Of course, I should offer the disclaimer that both Mike and I are not, and never have been, picky eaters.

He says we’re a couple of “human garbage disposals.”

I say we’re open-minded about food combinations.

Truthfully, we’re both right – my way just sounds much nicer.

Because we don’t often have weekends sans the 6-, 8- and 13-year-olds, we try to take full advantage of the foodie freedom when that happens.

In preparation of this past weekend, we stocked up on octopus, whole trout (the children don’t like their fishes to look back at them), monkfish, fresh golden baby beets and radishes.

Mmmmmmm.

We had exactly zero specific plans with everything, except the trout, which we intended to roast in foil packets.

So, with no plans, and a sense of adventure, we decided to make the octopus on Saturday night.

Sherman was a frightful looking creature (yes, I named him) what with his purple hue and long, sucker-laden tentacles.

I did what every good cook would do: laid him out on a large sheet pan, took pictures and sent them to some folks so they could see the wonder that would be our dinner.

It grossed out one pal’s daughter; another questioned my sanity for trying to make such an ugly creature edible.

Since octopus needs to cook low and slow to be tender and edible, we debated methods. Having made it before with Asian flavors, and as a light citrus salad, we opted this time to go Italian.

We both love puttanesca sauce (if you don’t know it, Google it – it’s salty, tart and delicious!) so we decided to make our version of it with octopus.

We roasted the beets to eat on the side, and served the sauce over the baby beet greens to save some calories. You can serve it over pasta, rice or quinoa if you want some starch.

If octopus isn’t your thing, and cooking is a necessity to eat more than an adventure to you, I would highly recommend just the sauce. It might be a dump and stir sauce that requires minimal effort, but I promise it’s delicious – and you won’t know that there are anchovies in there by the time it’s done.

If anyone is curious what we did with the trout, or how we made the monkfish, drop me an email at jharr@heraldstandard.com. Those, too, were an adventure in cookery.

Octopus Puttanesca

1, 2-2.5 pound octopus, cleaned

1, 28 ounce can crushed tomatoes

2 cups white wine

6 cloves garlic

2 tablespoons chopped capers

½ cup diced onion

4-5 anchovy fillets

½ cup Kalamata olives, chopped

Red pepper flakes

Drop the octopus into a pot of boiling water, and when it comes back up to a boil, let it go for 1-2 minutes. Take it out and cut it into big chunks. Sautee the onion for a couple of minutes over medium heat, then add the garlic and stir around for a minute or two.

Dump in the rest of the ingredients, including the chunked up octopus. Cover and simmer for about 30 minutes. Test the octopus by poking it with a sharp knife. The knife should go into the meat without much resistance.

Let it simmer another 30 minutes with the lid off, so that the sauce can reduce some.

Once the octopus is tender, the sauce is ready. Yum!

Jennifer Harr is the Herald-Standard’s news editor. Contact her at jharr@heraldstandard.com or follow her on Twitter @HSJenHarr.