They come in little packages, inside they're all curled up and cuddly next to each other, like they were cupcakes, or more accurately, rubber monsters. But if you are looking for a great, cheap frozen seafood idea, the frozen box of baby octopi is your way to go.

Of course you can argue, hardcore foodie that you are, that fresh is always better. Ah, but I will counter; what if you are single and live on a fifth floor walk-up? You're better off getting them frozen, where they've been hand gutted, with the eyes and beak torn out, leaving you with goofy looking, easily defrosted nuggets of weird looking, tasty fun that go great in all sorts of ways. You don't have to clean or peel them or do much in the way of anything to them. They're pure and sweet like they just came from the bosom of their giant, ship-wrecking mother (pictured at right).

The good thing about octopus as opposed to squid is that it seems to be a lot less tough (to me). Even the day after microwaving, they were still quite edible. Also, there's a distinctly mellow, all-consuming taste of the sea here. It tastes like seafood all right, but it has no distinct taste of its own outside of that mellow seafood vibe that's so good and not all sharp or bitter. Best of all, baby octopus both absorbs flavors and imparts its sweet but mild seafood flavor to other ingredients in however you are preparing it.

I'm a big fan of the frozen octopus, and I am always pulling a box of it out on a lazy Sunday evening when I want to galvanize myself for the week with something a little special, but not too ornate. Also, and don't laugh, I've been threatened by the giant black space squids that exist in the alternate dimension I sometimes access in my more mystical meditations, and eating octopi and squids is my taking of symbolic revenge on them. When I eat enough I will have essentially become like them, and be accepted into their world (I hope), so the next time I manage to cross into their dimension, they won't all come swimming at me like the rushing specter of death.

You probably don't share this trouble, having not looked, Orpheus-like, where you were not supposed to, but even so, you can enjoy the cryptic and easy to prepare pleasures that octopus has to offer. 

When I made mine last Sunday I was saddened to learn I had no cans of tomatoes in my cupboard, but it didn't stop me. I merely created my own recipe using the leftover remnants of a Paul Newman brand of spaghetti sauce.

First thing, was to start heating a pot of water for the buckwheat noodles (udon) that I like because they're healthier. I considered using rice instead, but it's always better, if for no other reasons than aesthetics, to mix tentacles with pasta.

Defrosting the octopi was simple, I merely tossed them into a bowl of hot water from my scaldingly hot tap, and added some salt. The box they came in said, in its colorfully broken English, that I should "rub salt on them until a foam appears." This seemed rather prematurely intimate on my part; I tried it but it felt… incestuous. Eventually I gave up and just tossed some salt in the water, emptied the water and re-filled it a few times, then threw them into a pan with a little olive oil. I fished among my half-empty marinade bottles and found Nobu, a delightfully cross dressing/marinade and threw some on top of the octopus while sautéing. I noticed the octopus was giving off a little juice so I thought to toss some dried seaweed in there as well.

Seeing how swimmingly this was all going down I realized that some kind of redness was needed and just as I was about to give up, a chance trip to the refrigerator revealed the 1/4 of Newman's Own  spaghetti sauce on the side of the door. I tossed that in there, and everything was good.

Now when prepping the octopus you have to, presumably, cut the heads off and maybe separate the tentacles. This can be hard because they're rubbery little bastards. If you have a big old meat cleaver though, this can be a lot of fun. It's very satisfying to rear back and do a serious chop on those things. Just make sure there aren't no fingers or anything around before you do it. Rear back and let out a loud deep, samurai-style yell as you chop down towards the center of the beast. Once you hack down, leave the blade where it is, half embedded in the cutting board, then, holding the blade down hard, pull the tentacles off from each side as you draw the blade towards you, thus making a clean easy cut. Otherwise you might shred the tentacles up, and at any rate, it's a lot of fun to do it this way.

As good as serving this stuff up the night before was, it was even better the next day for lunch. The delicious, sweet flavor of the octopi has mingled thoroughly with the Newman's and the seafood marinade and seaweed to form a rich, flavorful mélange which had thoroughly penetrated the pasta. There's something nice about mixing prepared spaghetti sauce in with "home cooking" -- it gives you the best of both worlds, the zesty salt air of the sea and the childhood recollecting presence of preservatives.