Half-dried squid fried with spicy tamarind sauce

Half-dried squid or semi-dried cuttlefish ("Mực một nắng") are very popular in Vietnamese seafood cuisine as well as in Japanese and Korean. The fresh squid or cuttlefish are cleaned very thoroughly and dried outside under very strong sunshine in one day. For that, half of water inside the squid body vapoured and the squid will be more crunchier but stay soft enough for cooking

In Lithuania, we do not have this fancy seafood, so often I buy the fresh squid and dry them quickly by our oven. Today I will write about how to prepare the half dried squid / cuttlefish and stir fry them with tamarind sauce. This is one of my best recipe for #beer night or weekend party 🦑 ❤️🍻

PREPARE THE HALF DRIED SQUID / CUTTLEFISH:

• Clean fresh squid or cuttlefish: cut to open wide the squid body (remove the squid heads if any). Use sea salt and lime to scrub both sides of the squid to clean and reduce the stinkiness. The best alternative way to clean the seafood is you should use the white strong liquor to clean the squid if you can find any cheap one. Remember to wash all squid again few times with cold water to remove excess white liquor or lime and salt on the squid.
  
• Pre-heat the oven 200 C degrees in 10 mins.
• While waiting for the oven preheating, cut into medium strips as my photo below.
  
• Arrange squid strips evenly on a grill tray with baking paper underneath (the water from the squid will drop in the tray while baking).
  
• After 10 mins of oven preheating, put the grill tray with squid in the oven and set 180 C degrees. Bake in total 14 mins. REMEMBER to change the side of the tray (right to left) after 7 mins. That is to make sure the squid to be dried evenly.
  
• REMEMBER BAKING FOR DRYING THE SQUID IN ONLY 14 MINS. We DO NOT bake or grill squid here 😅.

PREPARE THE TAMARIND SAUCE & STIR FRY THE SQUID:

• Peel, smash lightly, and chop 03 big cloves of garlic.
• Put a tea spoon of olive oil in a sauce pan to stir fry chopped garlic cloves in 2-3 mins until the garlic turns light brown.
  
• With the same pan under medium fire, pour:
  • 60ml water
  • 40g brown sugar
  • 02 table spoons or 35ml of fish sauce.
  • 03 table spoons of chili sauce (sriracha or homemade)
  • 03 tea spoon of tamarind paste
    
    
    35ml fish sauce
    
    40gr brown sugar
    
    03 tea spoons for tamarind paste
    
• Stir the mixture on the sauce pan in few minutes until the brown sugar melted all.
• Put all the half dried squid strips in the sauce pan and put 01 tea spoon of cayenne pepper powder.
  
  
  
• Mix and fry the squid in the sauce in 8-10 mins until the sauce turns thick and sticky to the squid strips.
  

SERVE:
This dish is the best side dish for a beer drink. The bread is highly recommended for dipping in its tamarind sauce. However, I love dipping green mangoes in this tamarind sauce. You should try it too.

Another tip: If you don't want squid, then just try to make the tamarind sauce only and you can dip any fries, bread or green fruit with this sauce. Beer is a good companion as always! 😂