- Oh my God.
- No freaking way.
- Way.
- You (screams)
- Ah!
(hammering)
- This is amazing.
(upbeat music)
- Today we are going to be making calamari with
(clicking noise)
coconut!
Honestly we could do a video just about
how to open a coconut.
We're going to give you that and more.
If you are a child,
do not do this!
Do not do it alone!
Get an adult to help you, please.
Honestly even if you're an adult
get another adult to help you.
Don't at me if you chop off your finger.
Coconuts are cool.
Coconuts are actually sneakily a very good source of fiber.
What we're looking for is to
scoop out the meat inside of this coconut
cause it's got a nice squid like texture.
Without further ado,
lets open this bad boy.
(air swooshing)
To break into a coconut you are going to need
a very sharp knife and a mallet.
This is a vegan show, just sayin'.
The first thing we are going to do
is we're going to shave down this top part here
with our very sharp knife.
Very, very, very sharp knife.
So we want to shave it down
until you see the brown little head underneath.
A little fire hat.
This isn't even the dangerous part.
This isn't even close.
(cutting coconut)
This is the brown that we want.
Do you see?
(horror music)
I'm in a weird mood today.
That was just me warming you up.
It only gets more and more dangerous from here.
We're gonna take this butt of this knife,
and you're gonna grip this in your safety grip,
which is like holding a pencil.
Somebody is going to yell at me for this I know it already.
Firm grip!
firm!
A firm grip is a must.
You also need to have passion behind your wrist
when you're doing this
because you can't have any second thoughts.
There's no going back,
and focus.
okay?
Here we go. (bell ringing)
(cutting coconut)
Okay we're going to do this a lot.
(cutting coconut)
Ah, that's the sound we like to hear.
(cutting coconut)
My points for being chosen for the roster
of being on a desert island just sky rocketed.
Inside a coconut is this
delicious liquid we call coconut water.
You probably buy some horrible version
of this at the grocery store.
There is nothing better than coconut water
from a fresh coconut.
Ah!
The sound of life!
Look at this beauty.
This is delicious.
This one looks pretty mature.
You want to keep the mature coconuts around.
In life too you know the mature coconuts
are the ones that'll have your back.
A little life tip.
(yelling)
I want to drink it out of this.
(gulping)
Worth it.
Delicious.
Lets empty our coconut water out.
(liquid pouring)
That is good stuff guys.
That is full of electrolytes.
We got a damp wash cloth.
Lay it out here, cutting board on top,
and you got no more of that risky business going on.
We're going to come down in a final action here.
One final chop.
(chops coconut)
Like that.
Going to put your other cloth over the top
of this bad boy.
You can take your mallet
this is where the risk comes into play.
If your wrist gets all wishy washy,
zigzaggin' all over the place,
you're not going to have a consistent straight cut
cause it would go all over the place,
you're not going to be able to scoop the meat out
as well as you would otherwise.
Okay, here we go. (bell ringing)
(hammering)
Hell yeah, oh my God!
Damn.
(hammering)
All right.
(dramatic music)
Yeah.
God, I'm so good.
(upbeat music)
(coconut ripping)
Would you look at that?
Now see, that is the stuff of the Gods.
Before we get to these two little friends of ours,
we're going to mix up our marinade.
For the marinade we're going to use caper juice,
olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest,
(upbeat music)
and my favorite thing in the world, garlic.
(upbeat music)
Give it a little stir.
Cool, lets put this aside.
So, to clean the meat out we're going to take a spoon,
now this is the opposite, this is a come down
from the rush you just had from
pounding this thing into oblivion.
Now we are going to be tender and gentle.
What you wanna do is try, if you can,
to get the meat out in one fell swoop.
So this is what you want.
I did a good job.
You basically want one big slab like this
cause then we're going to cut it into calamari strips.
Pick off some of the, you know the little
husk parts that stick to the meat.
So I'm going to cut these into half inch strips.
And I'm gonna plop them directly into my marinade.
Looks like a squid.
When I first heard of it, I was like "What?"
But now I see it.
Okay, just put them all in there.
I'm going to cover this up and I'm going to refrigerate it.
And I'm going to let his marinate
for about two to four hours.
I know it's a long time.
Start reading that book you've had on your night stand
that you're pretending that you're going to finish
but know you're not going to.
Take this opportunity to do that.
And I will be back in two to four hours.
Goodbye.
(upbeat music)
Oh my god, okay.
That's as good as that's going to get.
Okay, all right, so we've got our little
calamari strips out of the fridge ready to go.
And then over here we've got our mixture.
We're gonna have some non-dairy milk.
I'm using almond milk, unsweetened.
And then some apple cider vinegar.
Mix it up a little bit.
So, over here we've got our dry mixture
and we're gonna add some all purpose flour,
some semolina flour, and some salt.
We're gonna work right down the line.
We're gonna take out our marinated calamari strips,
we're going to put them in our liquid mixture,
then we're gonna let it drip off all the excess,
and then you toss it in the dry mix.
I use my hands because it's the easiest way
to evenly coat it.
And this way you can knock off
all the extra stuff too so you don't get
like chunks of flour when you're frying it.
I'm gonna put it right in
(gasps)
Ah, Yay!
The one handed dry shake is if you've been
doing it for awhile, you know?
It's how you know I'm a pro.
Wow, these crisp up pretty quickly.
(oil popping)
(screaming)
(oil popping)
(screaming)
Ah! I don't like that, I don't like that!
I don't like that at all!
But this is a beautiful strip.
Yay!
This is how I've decided I feel comfortable
operating around the hot oil.
(oil popping)
(screaming)
Oh my God.
I don't like that, I don't like that at all.
(boiling oil) (upbeat music)
Thank you.
(oil popping)
(screaming)
Oh my God (laughs)
I don't like it!
All right look at these!
These look amazing.
I feel like if I were to put these in front of
someone they wouldn't know the difference.
I don't think they'd ever think there was anything
suspicious but we have to see what they taste like.
So I'm gonna go ahead and do that right now.
I don't know about coconut as calamari.
I'm not gonna lie but--
(chewing)
Oh my God!
Woo!
That is fresh!
Feel like I'm floating in the ocean right now.
Wow, cool!
(clapping)
I like it!
I like it, I like it, I like it.
Just when I think, can't possibly get better.
I just do it, I do it again, and again, and again.
This is humble hour with Merle
I'm very excited about this, feeling very proud.
I'm going to go ahead and bring my friends in.
Lets have them try this,
we got nothing to worry about,
I feel like they're going to love this.
(classical music)
- It looks like a blooming onion.
- Ah!
- These are french fries.
- No they're not.
- French fries?
- No.
- French fries are vegan already (laughs)
- They're little fingers.
(laughing)
- Huh,
interesting.
Shrimp Coco.
(classical music)
- Mmm, Mmm, it's an onion ring!
Wait that's already vegan (laughs)
(laughing)
- Squid?
- Yes. Calamari.
- Meant to be calamari?
- Yes!
- Oh, calamari?
- Yes!
Yay!
Oh my God, that makes me so happy.
- This is so weird because the texture
is so, so spot on.
- Let me ask you this, are you liking it?
- I--
No.
- What is this made of?
- You gotta guess.
- Some type of tofu paper?
- I'm going to guess onion without even biting it.
- Nope.
- Not an onion?
- No.
- Is this a mushroom?
- Nah B.
- Oh I know what that is.
- You do?
- It's coconut.
- How do you know?
- I love coconut flesh, that's why.
- Are you kidding? - What?
This is impossible.
(laughing)
- Oh my God.
- No freaking way.
- Way.
- This is coconut?
- Yeah.
- This is amazing.
- You're in a restaurant. Here you go sir.
- Hmm, Oh.
Can I take you out after your shifts over?
- No.
- That's what I would say, not to women now though.
- Wedges to calamari, I'm gonna say a nine.
- Solid nine.
- Nine.
- Nine?
- Yeah.
- I would say a seven.
- I give it a two.
- Overall I'm gonna give it a ten.
- Seven point five out of ten.
- It's so good. You like it? (clapping)
- I do, I really loved it.
- I'm very pleased with your work, well done.
(clapping)
(screaming)
- Okay please cut, please cut.
Cut, cut, cut, cut.
(upbeat music)