Musky octopus in sauce with polenta

• Clean the musky octopus. Meanwhile, slightly fry the garlic in an earthenware pot. You can also use a pot with a thick bottom.
• When the garlic gets brown, add in the pot all the ingredients except the parsley, that you'll add at the end of cooking.
• Leave to cook over low heat for about an hour and a half.
• 30 minutes before you have finished to cook the musky octopus, start preparing the istant polenta. It will thus be ready together with them.
• Serve the musky octopus with polenta when they’re hot. Sprinkle them with parsley. Place the polenta on a crouton.

Now you just need to choose a good white wine and the right company to enjoy your meal!

In his Physiology of Taste, J. A. Brillat-Savarin wrote: “To invite someone to lunch means to be responsible for his happiness during the time he will spend under your roof”. In fact, especially in the cold days of winter, what’s better than staying home with your friends or family, enjoying a tasty but also cheap dish such as the stewed baby octopus with polenta? Venetian cuisine has a long tradition of cooking fish: it could not be otherwise, because both the lagoon and the Adriatic Sea offer delicious products every day. But that’s not the only reason behind the importance of fish in Venetian cuisine. There are also some historical and religious ones: during the Council of Trent, it was established that meat could only be eaten during specific times of the year. That’s another reason why Venetian gastronomy, especially the simple cooking, is full of recipes based on fish and shellfish.