Ojingeo-bokkeum — Spicy Stir-Fried Squid (오징어볶음)

Ingredients

• 600 g fresh squid, tubes and tentacles, cleaned; bought the day of cooking
• 1 medium onion, sliced into half-moons
• 1 medium courgette, cut into half-moon slices
• 3 stalks green onion, cut into 5 cm batons
• For the sauce
• 2 tbsp gochujang, CJ Haechandle cited in source
• 1 tsp gochugaru
• 2 tsp ganjang, Korean soy sauce
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1 tbsp sugar or maesil-cheong, maesil-cheong (plum syrup) preferred for restaurant-level result
• 1 tbsp garlic, minced
• 1 tbsp neutral cooking oil, high smoke-point oil for the wok

Method

1. 1
   Score the squid tubes diagonally in a crosshatch pattern, cutting through roughly two-thirds of the flesh without piercing the other side, so that the cuts open dramatically on contact with heat and give the sauce far more surface to cling to. Cut the scored tubes into bite-sized pieces. Leave tentacles whole or halved.
2. 2
   Combine all sauce ingredients — gochujang, gochugaru, ganjang, sesame oil, sugar or maesil-cheong, and minced garlic — in a bowl and mix to a uniform paste. Premix completely before any heat is applied, so that the moment the paste hits the hot pan it caramelises as one rather than scorching in patches where the gochujang lands first.
3. 3
   Set a wok or heavy pan over the highest available heat, add the neutral oil, and continue heating until the pan is visibly smoking, because a pan that falls short of this will draw moisture out of the squid and steam it to a pale, watery, and tough result rather than searing it. This is where the dish lives or dies: the oil should shimmer and produce wisps of smoke before anything enters the pan.
4. 4
   Add the onion and courgette to the smoking pan and stir-fry over sustained high heat until the onion is translucent at its edges and the courgette has taken a little colour but retains structure. Cook them through completely at this stage, because the squid will spend only seconds in the pan and cannot carry the vegetables to doneness.
5. 5
   Add the squid and pour the premixed sauce over in a single addition, tossing everything together continuously over high heat so the paste coats and lacquers rather than sitting and burning on one side. The squid is done when the crosshatch cuts have opened and curled, the sauce has thickened to a glossy coating, and the edges of the squid show the first signs of char — the total time from squid entering the pan to removal must not exceed 90 seconds, beyond which toughening is inevitable.
6. 6
   Add the green onion batons in the final seconds of cooking and toss once, keeping them in the pan just long enough to lose their raw sharpness while holding their colour and a faint bite. Remove the pan from the heat immediately.