Recipes make most of lobster

Wednesday is Christmas Day, and if you are planning a special dinner, lobster from Kona Cold Lobster would be a special treat!

We recently went to Maine where lobster is an important industry. If you’re ever in Bar Harbor, Maine, lunch at Stewman’s on the Pier is a great place for lobster!

The lobsters are steamed for 6 to 8 minutes, depending on their size and served with corn on the cob.

Lobster is low in fat, calories, and cholesterol, lower than lean ground beef and skinless white meat of chicken or turkey. Lobster meat contains omega-3 fatty acids, an important substance that seems to reduce hardening of the arteries and decrease the risk of heart disease, as well as amino acids, potassium, magnesium, vitamins A, B12, B6, B3 (niacin), and B2 (riboflavin), calcium, phosphorus, iron, and zinc.

To harvest, lobsters must be a minimum of 3 1/4 inches from the eye socket to back of the carapace, and a maximum of 5 inches to be considered legal.

When selecting a live lobster, choose the ones that are active in the tank, one that is listless may have been in the tank too long. Squeeze the side of the lobster’s body, which should feel hard, brittle, and tightly packed. You want to purchase a hard-shell lobster as it is meatier. During the summer and into the beginning of the fall months, lobsters are in some phase of molting. Maybe this is why we were always told to eat lobster during months ending with “r” which would be closer to winter months when their shells are hard. On a 2 pound lobster, the amount of meat in the hard-shell lobster could be 2 ounces more than a soft-shell one.

Steaming or boiling does not effect the flavor of the lobster, except when boiled, the meat could get waterlogged. If boiling, place the lobster head first to humanely kill them.

Here is the right way to eat a cooked lobster:

1. Twist off the claws.

2. Crack the claw with a nutcracker.

3. Separate the tailpiece from body by arching the back until it cracks.

4. Bend back and break flipper off the tailpiece.

5. Insert the cocktail fork where the flippers broke off and push.

6. Unhinge the back — the “tomalley” or liver, a delicacy to many lobster eaters will turn green when boiled.

7. Open the body, crack it sideways. There is good meat in this section, too.

8. The small claws are excellent eating — suck the meat out.

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A 1-pound lobster yields about 4 ounces of meat, a 2-pounder, between 8-1/2 to 9 ounces meat. If you want to stretch the lobster, make a lobster bisque.

Lobster Bisque

Serves 6

Bring large pot of water to boil. Add head first and boil until cooked through, 8 minutes:

2 1-lb. live lobsters

Using tongs, transfer lobsters to a large bowl. Reserve 2 cups of cooking liquid. Cool lobsters.

Working over the large bowl to catch juices, cut off lobster tails and claws. Crack tail and claw shells and remove lobster meat. Coarsely chop lobster meat; cover and chill. Coarsely chop lobster shells and bodies; transfer to medium bowl. Reserve juices from lobster in large bowl.

Heat in heavy large pot over high heat:

2 tablespoons olive oil

Add lobster shells and bodies and sauté until shell begin to brown, 8 minutes.

Add:

1 onion, sliced

1 large celery stalk, sliced

1 small carrot, sliced

1 garlic head, cut in half crosswise

1 tomato, sliced

2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon

2 tablespoon fresh thyme

2 bay leaves

8 whole black peppercorns

Mix in:

1/2 cup dry Sherry

1/2 cup brandy

Boil until almost all liquid has evaporated, 4 minutes.

Add:

4 cups fish stock or bottled clam juice

2 cups reserved lobster cooking liquid

Lobster juices

Simmer one hour.

Strain soup through sieve over large pot, pressing firmly on solids. Whisk into soup:

1/4 cup tomato paste

Simmer until soup is reduced to 3 cups, 15 minutes. At this point you can make one day ahead and refrigerate.

Add to soup and simmer for 5 minutes:

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

Dissolve to make a slurry:

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1 tablespoon water

Add to soup and boil until slightly thickened, 2 minutes. Mix lobster meat into soup and stir to heat through. Ladle soup into bowls.

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Here is a lobster salad roll recipe from “The Summer Shack Cookbook.”

Lobster Salad

Makes 3 cups

In a large bowl, gently stir together:

Cook and cool:

1 or 2 large lobsters, remove meat to get 1 pound of meat, cut into 1/2 inch chunks. Peel, seed and dice:

1 medium cucumber

Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon kosher salt, place in colander, let stand for 15 minutes, until most the water has been drained off.

Place lobster chunks, cucumber in large bowl, add:

1/2 cup mayonnaise

3 green onions, trimmed and thinly sliced

Season with:

Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste

Cover with plastic wrap and chill for at least 30 minutes.

Toast 4 hot dog buns, buttered on both sides in a hot skillet. Place lobster salad, lettuce in buns to make 4 rolls.

Merry Christmas!

Please feel free to e-mail me at wilson.audrey@hawaiiantel.net if you have a question. Bon appetit until next week.