Giant Parasite From a Giant Kraken Broiled Plain and With Sauce

Welcome back, Dungeon Meshi Maniacs!  How is Spring treating you?  We are coming up on some of my favorite eating based holidays.  Ham & Chocolate Day! Hot Dog Day! Hamburger Fireworks Day!  All great, all require a deep stomach to fully enjoy.  The best way to train that stomach?  Eating something large!  Not to jump immediately to spoilers but how about eating something large found in something gigantic?  Giant Parasite anyone?

Let's be upfront today, DMM's. I will eat a lot of things...but a parasite?  Where could I even buy that?  Seems like the FDA should, or at least should for now, stop the sale of tapeworms for human consumption.  And that's not my biggest complaint this week, DMMs. No, my problem is the bait and switch!  The monster I thought we were GOING to be eating today was the mighty Kraken!

The legendary sea monster itself.  Star of movies, famous for being released, name of a hockey team I believe.  When it comes to creatures of the deep they don't come more big league than this guy. As luck would have it, in the Dungeon Meshi world the Kraken takes the form of a giant squid. Oh man!  That is what I'm talking about.  Between you and me, DMMs, squid is one of my favorite foods.  It's so versatile!  Fried calamari is the stuff of legend!  Squid ink pasta?  I could eat by the ton!  Stewed squid?  I'll run to your home if you offer me some.  Best of all, Marcille agrees!

I share a lot in common with Macille and our love for squid is a big similarity.  Problem is the old...young girl gets a little too carried away when talking about the ways to prepare squid.  Boil, grill, dry, steam?  All good, all very easy to do.  Unfortunately she mentions that you can just eat squid raw.  I've had squid sushi which, while raw, is still prepared.  Laios, however, is the hungriest man this side of Toriko and just cuts out the middleman.

  

First off, you just can't go chomping down on tentacle like that.  I'm pretty sure it's not tasty but it has to be super chewy.  Maybe a little TMI, DMMs, but I once nearly choked on some overly chewy squid once.  My fat mouth was unable to break it down which meant it lodged into my throat.  Much panicked coughing followed!  I'm still here, wiser. Still eating squid.  Laois, however, decides to move on from the Kraken after one failed attempt to the next best thing.  Well, the next monster to attack him that is.

Coming out of the humongous Kraken is a snake-like creature.  Let's see, a single mouth and a little flat.  If you haven't already read the name of this blog then I'm sure you'll be surprised to find that the crew is attached by a...

Look, DMMs.  All animals have parasites of some kind in them.  Humans used to carry them all the time until we got better at flushing them out.  So a parasite in of itself isn't that freaky.  If anything the gang should be seeing more of them given how much wild game they are eating.  No, the problem is Laois jumps straight from "let's not even try to prepare the Kraken" to "let's eat this thing that came out the Kraken's butt".

Gotta admit, I'm starting to feel closer to Marcille the longer this story goes on.

I can only imagine the disappointment of going from potential plates of fried squid to eating a parasite you've never seen before.  Wait..disappointment isn't the right word.  Horror?  That's it, that's the right word.  I agree with Marcille 100%.  Two madmen are leading her to a potential bad time.  Thankfully, in this instance, I do not live in the Dungeon Meshi universe and have options other than eating giant parasite.  What could possible be similar to giant butt worm?  Hope you are hunger for Unagi, DMMs, because we are going to cook us up some freshwater eel!

 

"Don't be wild and insane, Nih, you memory failed glob of goo" I can hear you holler into a cushiony void. "You've made it painfully clear that you live in a landlocked jerk land!"  I'm touched that you remember, DMMs.  Correct that you are, have no fear.  While I don't have access to oceans or areas with freshwater eels I do have access to an awesome Japanese grocery store.  Problem solved! Clearly you need a fillet of eel for Unagi but you also need some sauce.  For that we'll be making our own!

Pretty straight forward stuff. Rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, and water?  See, there was supposed to be a fourth ingredient.  A little thing called Mirin, the sweet rice wine used for all things cooking.  Yours truly forgot that they were out of mirin even though they were right at a Japanese grocery store.  Boo.  Boo me.  Boo me all you like but I know a super secret!  If you are out of mirin a mixture of water and sugar can do.  It's not a perfect replacement but you have to work with what you got.  Three parts water to one part sugar.  We'll be using a 1/4 cup of "mirin" which comes to be three tablespoons of water and one of sugar.  Mix!

Dump the "mirin" or the real deal into a saucepan along with 1.5 tablespoons of rice wine vinegar and 2.5 tablespoons of sugar.  Just stir them together.

Looking pretty clear!  Let's fix that by dumping a fourth cup of soy sauce to the mixture.

Time to bring the heat!  Bring it to a boil then back off to a simmer.  Let that cook down for 13-15ish minutes.  You want it to reduce down in amount which will also let it thicken.  We all love thick sauces!

Trust me, DMMs, this smells as good as you think!  Take it off the burner and just let it rest while you focus on cooking the eel.  The gang used the old fashioned metal grill.

This is the classic way to cook eel.  Over a charcoal fire that you man with a fan.  I have to admit, I really wanted to give this a try.  But I don't have a grill and this is a very complex way to cook if you aren't used to it. You wouldn't think sitting and fanning a flame would hard! It's one of those deceptive techniques that if you screw up will ruin the meat.  Seeing how the eel was no cheap (landlocked!) I decided for the next best option. Look closely at the title of this blog, DMMs.  Notice any word that jumps out?  Begins with a B. BROILED!  We are going to use that part of the oven 75% of owners aren't even aware is there!

The two coils at the top of your oven are there for broiling.  Something they do with a fiery passion.  Your options are LOW and HIGH.  Easy enough?  Not quite.  Using the broiler can be touchy.  The cooking is fast and the heat is unregulated.  Meaning that your oven can overheat, freak out, give you an error number, and shut down.  Trust me, I know.  You'll also want to set the eel fairly close to the coils.  8ish inches on HIGH worked for me.  Turn the broiler on HIGH and wait a few minutes.  Put the eel on a baking sheet. METAL ONLY. Never EVER use glass with a broiler.  You'll be in for a shatteringly bad time.  Now stick that sheet into the oven.

Give it five minutes.  I said this cooks quick and I mean it!  Once that's up you'll want to open the oven and brush the sauce on!

Once you have the sauce on just close the door again.  Give it another 30 seconds and you are good for Unagi!  Just serve over rice or eat it straight.  Completely up to you!  I went the rice route.  Don't judge me, I love rice!  It's the perfect side dish.

I don't even have to pretend, DMMs.  This is on the best things you can make.  I wish I was a little better at getting some char on there, however.  That may be hard with my oven so maybe I will give the grill option a try.  However, I was very happy for a first time!

That's it for the giant parasite, DMMs.  We did a great job cooking this food ALL THE WAY THROUGH.  Why do I bring that up?  Food safety is very important to me. Laios, however, did eat the giant parasite raw.  And well.

Come back next week as we may be talking all things safety!