I use the baking dish I would use for a leg of lamb/pork/chicken.
About 2-4kg of occy.
Frozen for at least a week, this means the juice /liquid of the occy swells and breaks the fibres in the tentacles, if you don’t do this it will be like chewing a rubber band
Defrost and cut into 40mm pieces, I leave the skin and suckers on but that’s a personal thing.
Plonk the lot into the baking dish.
At this point in time I will peel the scab off of a cheap beer and say , “ here’s mud in your fancy boutique beers justis
Once I’ve finished having a giggle I search for whatever flavours I have in the cupboard, my standard has been a jar of crushed garlic and a jar of crushed chilli but ginger works ok as a substitute if one of the others is missing.
Add as little or as much as you want.
200g jar I do around half of each.
Cover the baking dish with alfoil , I like to double up on the foil, crimp around the edges as you want to seal the dish reasonably well.
Preheat oven to 180
Place the whole shebang in and give it 45-55 minutes.
When you pull it out have a quick bopeep to see if the occy pieces are uniform in colour.
If they appear a bit translucent in the centre cover with foil and give it another ten minutes.
If you have cooked it properly there should be about 2/3rds of juice in the dish.
Place it to the side for approximately 25 minutes.
Use this time to prepare a salad/ rice or whatever you want to go with the occy.
You may think that you want to cut your pieces smaller but the baking process will shrink them.
If you over do it the pieces will be tiny and flowery to taste.
If you timing is correct they will melt in your mouth.
The point of letting it cool is so the flavours re absorbed into the flesh.
I have let the occy cool completely then added it to a jar with celery ( number one ingredient in pickled occy) carrot sticks, collie, capsicum sticks and such with a dash of the juice and a nice vinegar.
If anyone tries it please decide on your own amounts of vinager and don’t be shy to mix everything up, just check around the 45 minute mark that it’s cooked.
Ps If you only have a small amount of occy check after 30 minutes. If you over cook it it’s a load of rubbish.
