Who knew there was a specific way to eat lobster. It might require a little bit of work, oh but the reward is delightful!
A few things to get you going~ a bowl (for shells), lobster scissors, nutcrackers, seafood pick or fork, plenty of napkins, melted butter and of course lobster!!! You may want to consider a lobster bib…and a nice pinot grigio or even a chardonnay, if you prefer dry.
Ok, here we go….
1. Remove the claws by holding the lobster body in one hand and twisting the claws off the body with your other hand.
2. Separate the tail from the body by twisting and pulling them apart with your hands.
3. Don’t throw out the body & head section-It has a lot of meat in it. First, pull the top shell away from the body and discard. Look inside the cavity. The green stuff is tomalley, and is edible. It’s basically the lobster liver. Remove it. If your lobster is a female, you’ll see black or red roe in the body cavity. It’s lobster caviar and is good. If it’s black, it’s uncooked, so don’t eat it this way. Steam it for a few minutes until it turns red, and then it’s edible.
4. Pull the legs and the pale-colored spongy gills away from the body. Suck the meat and juices out of the legs.
5. Back to the body cavity: pick out the thin papery shells separating the meat, and you’ll end up with quite a bit of lobster rib meat.
6. Go back to the claws. Separate the claws at the joints to get 4 pieces. Use the crackers or scissors to remove the shell and get to the meat. Scissors might work best here as sometimes the crackers crunch the claws up into little bits that get in the meat, and indulging in one big, unbroken piece of claw meat is definitely something to look forward to.
7. Now, work on the tail piece. First, pick off the tail flaps and suck the juices and meat out of the holes.
8. Next, extract the tail meat out of the shell in one piece. Stick your finger in the base of the tail at the smallest opening where the tail flaps were and push the tail meat out. It will look like a giant shrimp. If your lobster is a female, you’ll find roe at the top ridge of the tail meat. It’s delicious. However, if it’s black, it’s undercooked and inedible. Steam it for a minute or two to get it red, and then eat.
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