Calamari/squid

I just went to my local fish market and bought some fresh squid.  I was hoping to get some of your recipes and techniques on how to prepare it, other than dusting it with flour and frying it.  I would love to make it marinara sauce and serve over pasta. Looking forward to hearing your ideas.

I had a co-worker who used to make paella with it.  The only time I've eaten calamari was as an appetizer, small rings -  battered, and deep-fried.

Hi blue heaven:
Here is my family's recipe for squid; it is essentially stuffed and simmered for hours in a tomato paste-based sauce.
As a northern Italian recipe, it is traditionally served over 'polenta', but it is just as good over any pasta.
1. Use very large squid, approx, 10-12 inches is fine (recipe is for four squid)
2. Clean the squid, and skin them
3. Chop up the tentacles and fins, and put in a fry pan with one diced onion. Add bread crumbs to this, approx. a cup, and fry until the whole mixture is just moist enough to hold the breadcrumbs together.
4. Take each squid tube and fill half way only (make sure it's only half way) with this mixture.
5. Take six oz of tomato paste, dissolve in approx. two cups of water, and simmer the squid in this liquid for three or four hours. Simmer very slowly or the squid will shrink to nothing and will split.
6. Add tomato paste and water to this as it simmers, so that you get a nice thick sauce. I cannnot give you exact amounts for the liquid, as it varies with the time it cooks.
7. After four hours, you will have a thick, dark, sauce, that tastes like nothing else you have had, but it is so delicious. The squid will be tender and can be cut into pieces to be eaten with the pasta. But it is the sauce that is formed that is the best part of the dish
Like all peasant recipes, this takes a bit of time to do, but it is worth it.
You did ask for a recipe that is not just the fried squid we get at most places.
accent
 
 
 
 

This is a very interesting recipe.  I used to order a wonderful stuffed squid appetiser in an Italian restant in Daytona Beach.   It wad delicioud    but had no sauce on it.

My dad used to love the way a now defunct Italian restaurant used to make their linguine and calimari in marinara sauce. They used to toss a few chopped up anchovy filets into some olive oil to season the oil, throw in some finely chopped parsely, then add pre-cooked calimari. After a few tosses and coated with the oil, a few ladles of the house marinara sauce added. That was served over the linguini
Edit. My dad recalled something I forgot. There was a couple of splashes of wine to deglaze the frying pan b4 the sauce was added.
 
Sounds simple, but it turned out that they had a trick up their sleeve. No way in the world could you pre-cook the calamri where it was so very tender. One clue was the calimari had a ruddy brown-reddish tinge. Every recipe that I found on the net either had you throw the rings into the sauce to cook or fry them first in a frying pan in some oil. First method produces chewy rubber bands. Maybe the frying works, but not on a house burner limited to around 20K btu. Instead you get tough rubber bands and a lot of fluid and the heat doesn't recover.