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lobster advice


kpurvis

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I want to try a recipe from Martin Yan's new Chinatown book, Wok-Braised Lobster in Creamy Rum Sauce, for a dinner Saturday night. I have a chance to buy lobsters at a great price if I get them by Friday. But 24 hours seems a long time to keep lobsters alive in my refrigerator.

Should I kill the lobsters on Friday and keep their tails on ice? Or kill them and partially steam the meat on Friday? Does anyone have advice?

Also, I've never used any method of dispatching a lobster besides dropping it into steaming water. (I've been a coward). Any advice on the method I've seen illustrated, of sticking a skewer into the lobster behind the head? Is that from the back of the neck (so to speak) or from the underside?

Kathleen Purvis, food editor, The Charlotte (NC) Observer

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It is better if you keep them alive, but that may not be practical in which case I would kill them and boil. The keep them refridgerated in shell until you are ready to prep.

Do not drop them into boiling water. Apart from anything else, the estimable Steve Hatt tells me that toughens the meat. Place them in cold water which you bring to the boil. This basically sends the lobsters to sleep before the water begins to boil. When they wake up they are dead :biggrin:

If you want to kill with a knife, I have always used a sharp point from a Chefs knife placed on the head and given it one hard tap through the skull. I am told death is instantaneous.

hope this helps

S

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If your lobsters are very lively on friday night, they'll keep well in the fridge overnight sitting on seaweed and covered with damp towels.

Please do not torture your lobsters as you try to kill them. A very quick way to dispatch them is as follows, using a sharp chef's knife:

Place lobster down on counter, head toward you. Plunge tip of knife into the lobster just behind the head and quickly bring the knife down to bisect the head. The lobster is now dead. Turn lobster so head faces away from you and continue the cut through the lobster's body, bisecting it.

I don't know if this is the proper prep for your Martin Yan recipe, but it's a quick and sure way to kill your lobster without having to mess around poking the poor thing with skewers.

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When you get the lobsters Friday, ask the store to give you some seaweed. Keep the lobsters on the seaweed in a brown paper bag, in the fridge, and they should be all right until you're ready to cook them.

Simon is right about stabbing them in the back of the head. Or, if the recipe calls for cooking the raw lobster in pieces, just twist them apart while they're still alive. (Suzanne ducks from all the outraged reactions of people who think this cruel. If you do, apologize to them first.)

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This basically sends the lobsters to sleep before the water begins to boil.  When they wake up they are dead :biggrin:

If you want to kill with a knife, I have always used a sharp point from a Chefs knife placed on the head and given it one hard tap through the skull.  I am told death is instantaneous.

Is it the shock of waking up dead that kills them? :wacko:

Define death...cut em in half whilst alive, they still squirm about for awhile.What they are feeling i have no idea.

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How does placing lobsters in cold water send them to sleep?

it doesn't. Bringing to the boil does!!

FULE

S

And then why is that more kindly than dropping them into boiling water. Isn't it just slower and more painful?

I ask, not to be picky, but because I am entirely prepared to amend the way I prepare lobsters if I think it will relieve any putative suffering.

NIT

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My dad once read about putting live lobsters in cold water and bringing them to a boil as a humane way of killing them. It was horrible. The lobsters banged against the pot for a long, long time. When we finally ate them the flesh was totally waterlogged.

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For one who sae he haf fairy at the bottom of his garden. U ask an owful lot of kwestions

I am told and B'dog may tell me this is total bollocks that putting them in boiling water is a shock to the system and tightens up the meat. There is no way of knowing how cruel it is. However, esteemed fish merchant told me that by placing them in cold water which you gently bring to a boil, you just send them up the wooden stairs to bedfordshire and by the time the water reaches a boil they are dead.

I have heard this, since being told, from a few other sources ( including watching an old Robert Carrier programme in which he said this was by far the kindest method, but he preferred to cut them up while alive.

Who knows?

S

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Please do not torture your lobsters as you try to kill them.

yes. it is important to treat them with the consideration and respect that their natural enemies extend when devouring them on the ocean floor. we don't need any more negative karma in the world, what with you barbarians killing these creatures without wearing kid gloves. :blink:

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Tommy, if you have time, would it be preferable to wear rubber gloves when preparing lobsters in order to mitigate any cold or slimy sensations which might be experienced?

taking into condiseration my current ancillary obligations (both work-related and personal), i do not have time to respond to your query (although i appreciate the time you've taken in framing this question). i do, however, have plenty of time to burn bridges.

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Place lobster down on counter, head toward you.

Just to clarify: That's facing me? With their waving claws facing me as well? Thank heavens for rubber bands.

And thanks all for your fast replies. I'll think of you when I'm filling my refrigerate with seaweed and bissecting heads. :shock: And if the recipe turns out well and lobsters haven't snipped off my typing fingers, I'll report back on Monday.

Kathleen Purvis, food editor, The Charlotte (NC) Observer

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Please do not torture your lobsters as you try to kill them.

yes. it is important to treat them with the consideration and respect that their natural enemies extend when devouring them on the ocean floor. we don't need any more negative karma in the world, what with you barbarians killing these creatures without wearing kid gloves. :blink:

Tommy: we are not their "natural enemies" in the sense you meant. Even so, I doubt that lobster predators, at the bottom of the ocean, intentionally devise complicated, and possibly tortuous, ways of killing the things. They just kill and eat. That is what we should do also. Sticking a skewer into their spine, or whatever the procedure Kpurvis describes, for a newby, would probably involve unnecessary "agony" (whatever that is) for the lobster. If you simply cut it in half you instantly kill the thing. If you drop it into boiling water you almost instantaneously kill the thing.

I'm no lobster hugger, that's for sure. But the proper way to dispatch a lobster is quickly, technically and morally.

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Tommy: we are not their "natural enemies" in the sense you meant. Even so, I doubt that lobster predators, at the bottom of the ocean, intentionally devise complicated, and possibly tortuous, ways of killing the things. They just kill and eat.

i didn't mean to suggest that we are. although we are.

Even so, I doubt that lobster predators, at the bottom of the ocean, intentionally devise complicated, and possibly tortuous, ways of killing the things. They just kill and eat.

you must not watch PBS very often. ever seen an animal in the wild kill its prey? it looks to me, generally speaking, to be neither "quick," "technical," nor without unnecessary "agony." but perhaps its moral. :wink:

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Turn lobster so head faces away from you and...

Is this done out of respect for the recently departed?

(humorless today) No...to make it easier to complete the cutting action.

Really!? Come on, it was a joke.

Has everyone gone and lost their senses!!!? Or can we not infer tone without emoticons?

:biggrin: There, is that better?

"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut." -Ernest Hemingway

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Things like lobsters, chicken, beef, and any other animal that we eat *benefits* (in a species-wide, genetic sense) from being eaten - it has an advantage over any competitors, in that we will keep it alive (thus modifying its evolution) if it is ever in danger. Think of the species, not the individual.

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No one can doubt that lobsters, like brain-damaged humans, are alive whether or not they are conscious of pain. Even if you feel that you have to eat them, they have a right to be treated humanely.

(I once stuck a chefs knife through the head of a lobster and a lot of water squirted out. Kinda gross. Now I just grabs 'em by the tail and bangs 'em against the floor until they're good and stunned.)

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Even if you feel that you have to eat them, they have a right to be treated humanely. 

this is all so bizarre because everyone claims that there way is the least painless. who the fuck knows? people get behind this crap without one ounce of thought, and then try to pass it off as science. baffling i tell ya.

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Even if you feel that you have to eat them, they have a right to be treated humanely.  

this is all so bizarre because everyone claims that there way is the least painless. who the fuck knows? people get behind this crap without one ounce of thought, and then try to pass it off as science. baffling i tell ya.

Someone please let me know when Tommy exhibits at least one ounce of thought (and I don't mean 10 years ago either) on any subject.

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