Italian · Naples · main

Polpo alla Luciana

Name: Polpo alla Luciana
Prep time: 1 h 8 min
Total time: 1 h 10 min
Cuisine: Italian · Naples
Ingredients: baby octopus — 1200 g; grape tomatoes — 400 g; garlic — 12 g; olives — 80 g; capers — 30 g; small dried chilli — 5 g; flat-leaf parsley — 20 g; extra virgin olive oil — 74 g; salt — 5 g; freshly ground black pepper — 3 g; country ham — 112 g

Polpo alla Luciana reads umami 8.2, salinity 7.4 and richness 6.6 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a Italian · Naples main, about 1 hr 10 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

Umami & Savory — 9.7 / 10
Sweet & Fruity — 3.3 / 10
Sour & Bright — 2.1 / 10
Bitter & Earthy — 2.3 / 10
Rich & Fat — 6.7 / 10
Aromatic & Spice — 4.0 / 10

The measured notes (of 18)

Umami 8.2 · Salinity 7.4 · Richness 6.6 · Marine & Briny 4.2 · Funk & Ferment 3.6 · Allium 3.6 · Sweetness 2.7 · Herbaceous 2.1 · Sourness 2.0 · Smoke 1.9 · Fruity 1.9 · Bitterness 1.5 · Heat 1.5 · Warm Spice 1.4 · Earthy 1.3 · Floral 0.8

What's in it (11)

baby octopus — 1200 g
grape tomatoes — 400 g
garlic — 12 g
olives — 80 g
capers — 30 g
small dried chilli — 5 g
flat-leaf parsley — 20 g
extra virgin olive oil — 74 g
salt — 5 g
freshly ground black pepper — 3 g
country ham — 112 g

Time & effort: about 1 hr 10 min (1 hr 8 min active) · effort: involved

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 80.4 kcal, 11.1 g protein, 1.2 g fat, 5.6 g carbs

Dietary: Contains meat · Contains seafood — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (7 steps)

Choose an octopus of about 1.2 kg. Very small ones toughen and very large ones need hours; this weight cooks in the time below. Frozen and thawed octopus is not a compromise here, it is an advantage, because freezing breaks down the muscle.
Put the olive oil, garlic and chilli in a heavy pot just wide enough to hold the octopus, and warm over medium heat for 2 minutes until the garlic is fragrant.
Add the whole octopus, the tomatoes, olives, capers, half the parsley, the salt and pepper. Add no water and no wine at all. The Neapolitan name for this method is affogato, drowned, and what it drowns in is the octopus's own liquor.
Cover the pot, seal the lid with a sheet of greaseproof paper trapped under it, and cook over the lowest possible heat for 50 to 60 minutes. Do not lift the lid for the first 30 minutes. Within ten minutes you will hear liquid moving; the octopus will have released enough to half-submerge itself.
Check at 50 minutes: the thickest part of a tentacle should take a skewer with only slight resistance, and the skin should still be attached rather than sloughing. If it is still rubbery, give it 15 minutes more and check again. Overcooked octopus goes stringy and there is no way back.
Lift the octopus out, cut it into thick pieces and return it to the pot. Raise the heat and boil hard for 4 to 5 minutes to reduce the sauce until it is dense and glossy and the oil has separated at the edges. Stir in the rest of the parsley.
Serve over the toasted bread, with the sauce spooned generously so the bread soaks it up.

Dishes with a similar flavor shape

Anchoïade — French · Provence
Baked Salmon Puttanesca — Italian-American
Southern Gumbo — Southern
Banh Bao Thit — Vietnamese
Bacalao a la Vizcaína — Basque · Hegoalde (Spain)

Keep reading: what umami, salinity, richness mean in the flavor lexicon · the world's cuisines, by flavor.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.