How are y'all about eating octopus?

My first experience with cephalopods as food was as a teenager at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco where I ate fried calimari—delicious! I quickly became an aficionado of all kinds of squid dishes. I was once dumped by a girl who told me that ever since our dinner at The Tides Restaurant in Bodega Bay, she would have flashbacks of me with a tentacle hanging out of my mouth.

About 30 years ago, somebody introduced me to nigiri sushi which has become, in all of its forms, my favorite food. I loved the soft fish: maguro, saba, saki. But my first taste of tako—octopus—didn't do much for me. Little flavor, cartilaginous texture.

My policy in those days was: squid, yum; octopus, yuck. But over the years, I came to enjoy tako's delicate flavor, its mouth feel so like the art gum erasers I used to eat in sixth grade.

If you live in Mexico, you're gonna rub shoulders with octopi. They're a popular and inexpensive seafood. I particularly like octopus in ceviche—seafood that has been "cooked" by marinating in lime juice.

Octopus is a significant food in Spain and other mediterranean countries too. What surprises me, though, is the degree of specialization in the retail tentacle trade.

Octopus 'R' Us. Just Octopus.

OK. Just octopus and squid. But that's it. No clams, no hams.

Can you make a living like that? Maybe not. The place is never open. But then, a lot of businesses in Spain seem never to be open. Doesn't mean they're not in operation. Just not when I'm there.

The other day I was enjoying a meal of lightly breaded sauteed seafood and thinking about how ordinary foods like octopus had become to me. My plate contained octopus, squid, whitefish, fresh sardines and barnacles.

Yep. Barnacles. They're really, really good. Poor man's clams. Much appreciated in Spain, restaurants tempt patrons by displaying bowls of them in their windows.

I liked mine so much that next chance I got, I ordered a whole plateful of them. Really. I'm not lying.