🇪🇸 Spain · Family: Bocadillo de Calamares · Region: Madrid · Heat: Fried · Bread: barra · Proteins: squid
The Bocadillo de Calamares a la Romana is the battered cousin of Madrid's fried-squid sandwich. A la romana means the squid is dipped in a light egg-based batter before frying rather than simply dusted in flour, and that single change defines the sandwich. It is a Madrid preparation, and the angle is the texture difference: where the plain floured version gives a thin, crackling shell tight to the ring, the Roman-style batter puffs into an airy, golden crust that stands away from the squid. Same city, same squid, a different mouthful.
The build follows the fried-squid logic but with the batter as the variable that has to be controlled. Squid rings are coated in a loose batter and dropped into hot oil, where the coating inflates and sets crisp around the still-tender squid. The fried rings go straight into a split barra, usually with the crumb wiped in olive oil, while hot, typically with lemon and often a smear of mayonnaise or alioli. Good execution means a light, dry, evenly puffed crust with no raw doughy patches, squid that is just cooked and still tender inside it, and bread crusty enough to carry the load without going damp. Sloppy execution is a heavy, greasy, bread-like coating from cold oil or thick batter, rubbery overcooked squid, or a soggy crust that has steamed itself flat inside a closed sandwich left sitting.
The sandwich shifts the same way its plain sibling does, through acid and sauce. Lemon squeezed over the rings is close to mandatory because the batter adds bulk and fat that need cutting. Alioli gives it garlic backbone; a streak of hot sauce or a few raw onion rings adds sharpness. The relationship that matters most is the comparison itself: the flour-dredged Madrid bocadillo de calamares is the better-known reference point and a distinct enough preparation that it deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here. What stays constant in the a la romana version is the batter discipline. The coating has to fry up light and crisp around tender squid, because a thick, soggy, oil-heavy batter is the specific failure this style is most prone to.
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Other Bocadillo de Calamares sandwiches in Spain: