Cyprus Recipe  - Recipe Greek Grilled Octopus

This dish can be served as a Meze (appetizer) or, if you love octopus as much as I do, as a main course. If served as an appetizer it goes really well with Ouzo.

This is absolutely one of my favorite dishes and brings back many good memories. I spent many an evening munching on grilled octopus, drinking ouzo and chatting with an old Greek old fisherman on one of the small islands. He used to cook the octopus outside his harbor-front cottage on a small Hibachi grill.

1 large octopus, 3 lbs, cleaned (see below) or 1 cooked octopus
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp oregano
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
4 lemons, cut in to halves

Cut the cooked octopus into 4 or 8 pieces. Combine all the ingredients for the marinade and let the octopus marinate overnight.

Prepare the barbecue to about medium. Shake the excess marinade from the octopus, place on to the heated barbecue and cook. Keep an eye on the octopus to ensure it does not char � baste with the reserved marinade until well done.

When cooked, cut the octopus in to bite sized pieces and serve with the lemons and crusty bread.

Serves 4-8.

To clean the octopus:

Cut away the hood, remove the eyes and squeeze out the beak at the mouth opening. Wash the octopus well and place in a large pan without drying the octopus. Cover and cook over low heat, adding no liquid to the pan, for about an hour, until the octopus is bright pink and tender. Remove the octopus, wash under cold water, drain, and allow cool. Discard the liquid from the pan. Your octopus is now ready to be used.