Lobster Love

I do not have that very common love of lobster, growing up in the Bay Area, I would actually much rather eat some fresh Dungeness Crab.  Lucky for Brian, I will never request an expensive dinner of poached lobster, nor even one of those tiny, yet oh-so-popular, $13 lobster rolls.  However, after weeks of Brian longing to cook live lobster and spending hours scanning over the numerous websites selling Fresh Maine Lobster, I gave in...I am always in for a challenge.  However, I knew that we could find some great lobster locally without having to pay the overnight delivery fees needed to get it shipped directly to us.  I got some insider recommendations and then called up the best local seafood sellers to see what was available.  We ended up getting a great price, and some super fresh lobster.  

We carried them home in a paper bag. Brian was questioning if the lobsters were confused in the darkness of their carrying case.  I told him to stop thinking about the them with any sort of compassion because he was about to drop them in a very large pot of boiling water.   

After double checking a few recipes and You-Tube videos, we dunked our crustaceans in boiling water for about 13 minutes.  When we pulled them out, they were bright red...Then straight to the ice bath to keep them from overcooking.   

What about a lobster even looks remotely appealing?  Maybe their beady eyes and pointy feelers?

    Getting the meat out was fairly easy.  We twisted the tail from the body then sliced the tail in half and  simply removed the meat.  We cracked the tough claws by banging them with the back of a chef's knife, or a  mallet.  The meat slipped out staying perfectly intact.  

Finally, we used a rolling pin on the thin legs slowly using the rolling pin to squeeze out the meat.  With just a little elbow grease it worked like magic. 

Once they were all cleaned, we tossed the shells back into some of the lobster cooking water to start a lobster stock. After a thorough cleaning of the kitchen (and taking all the leftover lobster scraps all the way outside to the trash can), we used our fresh lobster meat to make a creamy lobster risotto, sprinkled with fresh dill. 

Brian was happy that he finally had his adventure and could now finally sit down to his dish of pure lobster love.