When I went up to New Haven, CT a few weeks ago, my mother had the brilliant idea of having a mid-day lobster boil for lunch. Apparently the New Haven farmer’s market has a stand that sells live local lobsters for a very good price. Boiling lobsters is a new thing for my parents, because they’ve only had lobsters cooked Cantonese style or perhaps in an occasional bisque or as lobster thermidor.
So, after trekking to the farmers market, we brought home 7 live lobsters! They were a pretty good deal too. Rather than charging by the pound, the lobster stand charged $8 for each lobster. They aren’t huge, but was enough for everyone to have one.
Hello, lunch!
My nephew was pretty fascinated with them as you can see:
"Oh no, lobster!"
By the end of the weekend, my wonderful 2-year-old nephew was making claw gestures out of his hands while saying, “Oh no, lobster!” I love teaching him new words.
Anyway, there really isn’t much of a recipe to this post. All you do is take a pot of salted boiling water, put the lobster in for about 7-8 minutes, and then you’re done. We had some melted butter and lemon juice to dip on the side. It’s really easy, delicious, and pretty healthy too! I guess the only thing some people may have to get over is the fact that one does have to kill an animal in their kitchen. I actually like doing that, because it makes me feel more connected with my food, but my best friend Yas would probably become a vegetarian if she had to do this. But hey, look, now we have delicious lobster!
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I’ve never cooked fresh lobsters myself but my future father-in-law does quite often and I’ve watched him do it a few times. The claws are what scares me even though I know I’m a LOT bigger than the lobster! He also just boils them and we eat them with melted butter with some garlic in it. SO good! I’ve watched him do pretty much the same with fresh crab too.
Omigod, I had lobster this weekend too at my goodbye party at my adviser’s house… That’s so funny. And I played with one of them, who swung his rubber banded claw around, which startled me and I dropped him on the table, where he promptly slipped and plopped onto the floor, swinging his little legs around. I nearly sobbed. And then my advisor called for him to join his family in the boiling water. I went outside and wandered around so I didn’t have to watch or see it happen. But it was delicious with butter sauce. Although cracking the whole thing to pieces was reminiscent of the work it takes to eat meat off the bone… Which you know I love to do. But it really was a fun food experience. Aww, you know me so well. I was sad about the boiling death pool.
I am always fascinated by lobsters.
Who’s that tall drink of water? Also, make me lobster.
I have never cooked a lobster before and until reading this blog post had no idea. They are too expensive where I am. It sounds similar to the blue crabs we have here.
That tall drink of water is Tom, my boyfriend/partner! That little drink of water is my nephew Jing. Isn’t he cute?