The other day I was enjoying a special lunch at Manolo León and was urged to try the new chipirone croquettes, and well, they were amazing! So much flavour and served with an ajoblanco sauce.

I loved them so much that last weekend I decided to try making them myself – so be forewarned that this recipe is totally off the top of my head. But in fact, it was quite an adventure and the croquetas turned out very nicely. Instead of ajoblanco I served a bit of salsa az on the side, and instead of chipirones I used smallish calamari (the only squid I could find on a Sunday), but what the heck.

Ingredients and instructions below the links.

• 4 medium calamari (500 – 700 grams)
• 1 4-gram packet frozen squid ink
• 1/2 onion
• olive oil/butter
• 1 tbsp flour
• 1 cup (250 ml) milk
• salt & freshly ground black pepper
• 2 eggs,  beaten
• fine breadcrumbs
• oil for deep-frying

First clean the squid. Gently pull the head while holding firmly onto the body … the head should just pull away and also pull out the entrails. If not, poke around until the inside is clean, then rinse while peeling off outer purplish outerskin layer, and set aside. After that cut off the tentacles from the head (be careful to remove the beak) rinse well, and toss all but the cleaned body sack and the tentacles away. There, that feels better, doesn’t it?

[click on images to enlarge]

I put the tentacles to one side, because I like them deep fried separately. Up to you.

Sauté the squid in a bit of olive oil on medium heat until very lightly browned and cooked through. Let cool on a cutting board and then chop into smallish 1-2 cm chunks. Put the chopped squid into a blender/food processor and pulse gently until it is a kind of chunky blend. Not a smooth paste. Set aside.

Put a dollop of butter and some olive into a saucepan and sauté half an onion. When translucent, add some salt and freshly ground black pepper, then quickly stir in a tbsp of flour. After about 30 seconds add the milk, turn up the heat a bit, and keep stirring until the mixture thickens nicely. Then take it off the heat, stir in the squid ink, and then add the chopped up squid. Mix well, put into a bowl and refridgerate until solid.

Beat eggs in one bowl, put bread crumbs in another. Form the squid mixture into balls, dip in breadcrumbs, then egg, then breadcrumbs again, patting well to make sure the squid ball is evenly coated. Once the are all done, put in fridge again for about half an hour.

Deep fry until golden on the outside and heated through on the inside.