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This American Life undertook a relatively serious investigation of this question (calamari 'rings' as pork rectum) and they basically came away with "inconclusive":

https://m.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/484/do...

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I can't listen to it right now (I will later, because TAL is great), but did they do a blind taste test? I wish I could remember where I found it, but some curious foodies tried it and the pork rectum had a... let's call it "distinct" flavour that was unpleasant and difficult to mask.

yes they did. they were able to mask it. they also had some less masked but thought it would just be perceived as off squid.

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