Check out tasty dishes to spice up your life

Mixed fried seafood — or fritto misto di mare — can be found throughout Italy; however, the most iconic and evocative incarnation hails from Campania. Indeed, it’s easy to imagine sitting in a Neapolitan trattoria eating crisp, piping hot tidbits of fried seafood while looking out on the Bay of Naples.

Red mullet, squid or cuttlefish and shrimp are some common choices you might find in classic versions. The seafood is lightly dusted with flour before frying, and it must be eaten right from the pot to be crispy.

In a home kitchen, we knew we would need to fry our seafood in batches to prevent the oil temperature from dropping excessively. Adding cornstarch to the mix kept our first batch crispy while we fried the second. (Unlike flour, cornstarch is a pure starch whose molecules lock into place during the frying process to form a dry, brittle coating.)

For the fish, easy-to-find, mild-tasting sole or flounder fillets were thin enough to cook through in the time it took the coating to adequately brown. The shrimp are fried and eaten shell and all, as the shell fries up crisp. We found that by cutting through the shells, we could achieve even more delicate results because moisture could quickly escape.

To ensure that the shells fry up crisp, avoid using shrimp that are overly large or jumbo. We prefer 31- to 40-count shrimp here, but 26- to 30-count may be substituted. Use a Dutch oven that holds 6 quarts or more. Trim any squid tentacles longer than 3 inches.

FRIED SEAFOOD

Servings: 6 Start to finish: 45 minutes 12 ounces shell-on mediumlarge shrimp (31 to 40 per pound) 3 quarts vegetable oil 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 1/4 cup cornstarch Salt 12 ounces squid, bodies sliced crosswise into 1/2-inch-thick

DANIEL J. VAN ACKERE — AMERICA’S TEST KITCHEN VIA AP Fried seafood in Boston.