The slow-cooked calamari experiment

Now I've had rubbery, overcooked, gross calamari in restaurants before. After all, everyone knows that squid are best when cooked, hot, fast, and not too much, or they become little marine-based chunks of tire rubber. But I had heard somewhere that if you cook them low and slow, they will become very tender again and delicious. I had to try this. So I made up a nice quick tomato sauce of carrot, onion and garlic, a little white wine, some tomatos and tomato paste, some dried herbs, and a pinch of both salt, pepper, and suger (to cut the acidity from the tomatos and the wine a bit).

I let that dutch oven simmer over the lowest flame my stovetop could muster. Since it took 3 hours to cook, I took the liberty of roasting a little garlic, smearing it on some bread with some pecorino and olive oil, adding a few freshly torn basil leaves, and having a snack. Simple garlic bread? Yes, I know it's not too creative, and I don't really count it as a recipe quite yet, since it was basically just a sauce and roasted garlic delivery device (for me, garlic bread is more of an eating utinsil than aside dish!) Of course I made enough for dipping in my squiddy-masterpiece haha.

Well, after 3 hours for a project I thought at first might just take 1 or 2 tops, I dished out a bit of the calamari tomato sauce, topped it with some fresh herbs and pecroino and took a big bit of my squid sauce (technically, a mariner's sauce or marinara? I'll look into that hehe). Wow. I must say this is probably my favorite way to eat squid now. It was almost as soft and tender as cheese! The acidity balance I had been so concerned about earlier was perfectly balanced with the taste of fresh herbs, cheese, and the subtle hints of clean ocean in the sauce, as though it had been flavored by the Mediterranean breeze itself. It's a simple dish, with no real accompaniment aside from some simple and crusty garlic bread, and to be quite honest, that's all this dish really needs...aside from a nice glass of wine of course!
1 more dish down, 494 to go!