lobster salad rolls

[lemony]

just got home from an amazing, relaxing week in cape cod, where i had my first ever lobster salad roll. i've been wanting to try one since reading a glowing piece by jane & michael stern in gourmet a while back. i know it's mainly an east coast thing but does anyone know of somewhere in seattle that serves a fine lobster salad roll?

the lobster salad shouldn't be difficult to replicate, it's the squishy white roll that i fear will be elusive.

lemony

[little ms foodie]

I haven't seen them here, I look everytime I come back from Boston where I love to have them for lunch! The rolls used there are really just hot dog buns, maybe have a lobster salad sandwich night at your house?? Let us know what time to be over!

[Jason Perlow]

Why have a lobster roll in Seattle when you can have Dungeness salad on a roll? Just make it yourself. Hell, if I lived in Seattle, I would make them almost every day!

[tsquare]

heyjude and I wrote about this lack in Seattle and thought it would make a great stand at the Market. No lobster, but the chowder place across from Made In Washington now sells crab rolls - pricey, and I haven't seen one to judge it - or tasted one. Did have a fabulous Maine lobster salad at Lark last weekend...

[Holly Moore]

For a born again Downeaster like me, the term "Lobster Salad Roll" is akin to chalk scraping across a blackboard. The classic lobster roll is just lobster and mayonnaise or lobster and melted butter on a toasted New England style hot dog bun.

A New England style hot dog roll is one that is slit is down the top of the bun instead of along the side and the sides of the bun are bread-like - no crust. This means one can butter and toast both the inside and the outside of the bun. Trader Joe's, in Philadelphia at least, sells a whole wheat version. So that may be one source. Other than that, they are hard to find though some of the mail order lobster companies will ship the rolls to you.

I've had "Lobster Salad Rolls" where there is some lettuce and mayonaise at the bottom and a lobster salad with celery on top, in the roll. And I grudgingly admit I enjoy that too. But it is not a genuine Lobster Roll.

It depends on motive. If the vendor is adding the lettuce and celery for taste and aestetics, it is ok. If the vendor is adding the lettuce and celery because lettuce and celery cost a whole lot less than lobster, shame on him.

Bonafide Downeasters are known for their miserliness and for their happiness with the way things have always been. I suspect they lack my tolerance for a lobster salad roll.

[slbunge]

In one of the essays in It Must Have Been Something I Ate, the intrepid food writer Jeffrey Steingarten discusses the classic lobster roll including the Pepperidge Farm top sliced Frankfurter Roll that is the only appropriate choice. There is also a recipe and instructions on how to steam a live lobster if you choose to do that yourself.

The essay is called, simply, 'On a Roll'.

[kiliki]

That is a terrific essay and has made me crave a lobster roll ever since I read it.

If you want a lobster roll in Seattle you will have to make it yourself, unfortunately. Really, if you want lobster ANYTHING in Seattle you'll probably have to make it yourself-I rarely even see lobster on a menu (El Gaucho and the Met are the only places that come to mind).

Edited August 18, 2004 by kiliki (log)

[lemony]

how could i have forgotten the steingarten essay?! one of my favorite books, thank you for reminding me.

tsquare, i am in complete agreement re: a stand in the market. that and another frites stand would just be an excuse to make tons of money.

the lobster salad i had came from the Lobster Pot, located in provincetown. i actually managed to eat lobster nearly every day i was there and, although i can see where lobster salad may offend some, it was a damn fine lunch. twice.

equally delicious from the Lobster Pot: tim's clam chowder, shellfish algarve, portugese soup, fried clam strips (wonderfully light), and the bloody marys were sublime. lobster pot

lemony

[kiliki]

You are KILLING ME. I had planned to visit friends in Maine next month, largely just to eat lobster every day, but I am too swamped with work and cannot go.

[lala]

heh heh heh ...I'm off to Maine for a week and a half in September.....

I've had one lobster roll in my life (and wasn't overly impressed), but I shall take my research quite seriously. However, as a Dungie fan, I'm curious to see how a truely fresh lobster compares...

[malarkey]

tsquare, i am in complete agreement re: a stand in the market. that and another frites stand would just be an excuse to make tons of money.

How 'bout a stand that sells both? A Dungie roll and frites. hot damn!!

[elswinger]

You can get some overnighted from here: http://www.hancockgourmetlobster.com/item/...t_lobster_rolls

[MGLloyd]

Back in the early 90's, my wife was stationed in Groton, Connecticut for 2.5 years. When she had time off, she spent a lot of time going up the Atlantic coast to Maine. She still talks to this day about the number of 'shacks' on the waterfront all over New England that sold clams in every possible permutation and lobster rolls. And very cheaply, too. She recalls that the most common type of lobster roll was pure lobster with a mayonnaise binder served on a top-sliced hot dog bun.

Then she was transferred to San Diego and then Puget Sound, where she has never been able to find a lobster roll, and indeed, virtually no one has ever even heard of the concept unless they are from the New England coast or spent time there. And don't even get her started on the 'pork tenderloin sandwich' as made in the Midwest, which she also cannot find out here.....

Edited to add: Hmm, finding fresh lobster here in Seattle is both difficult and pricey. I wonder if anyone sells chunks of frozen lobster. Costco or Trader Joe's, are you listening? I wonder if one could make a pale fascimile of a lobster roll using something like that.

Edited August 19, 2004 by MGLloyd (log)

[tsquare]

In the name of research, I sprung for the "crab roll" at Pike Place Chowder. It's dungie, plus mayo, some celery, a little lettuce, and some "spice" (not much) on about 6" of roll. Nope, not a squishy hot dog type, a section of not great baguette - too tough a beast. Not really toasted, though advertised as such. It was okay, but not worth running down to get one. At just under $10, a bit pricey.

Now, as I recall, Vivandi (?) in the market has some form of lobster sandwich - on foccacia?

[tsquare]

edit- dual post

Edited August 19, 2004 by tsquare (log)

[eatrustic]

This doesn't help the "where to find in Seattle" query but the Costco's in Vancouver B.C. are serving lobster rolls in their snack bars and although I'm not much of a lobster fan myself they are given pretty high marks by my lobster eating friends and family. ...And yes it it is 100% real lobster, although more on the shredded side. For $5.99 (Can.) you can't go wrong.

I'll be in Seattle next week to do my annual Salumi and Matt's eatstravaganza and will check the Costco there although I'm sure you guys would know if they had it.

[MGLloyd]

I was in Boston earlier this week to attend a seminar on patient safety and healthcare quality. I seized the opportunity to eat both a lobster and lobster rolls. I was staying in Cambridge in Harvard Square.

I had two lobster rolls done by local restaurants. Both of them used a Pepperidge Farm top-loading hot dog roll. Of note, I have never seen such a roll anywhere in the Seattle area, but they looked like a very handy type of roll given that the contents would not fall out, unlike a side-loading roll.

The first restaurant served the roll with chunks of fresh lobster that appear to have been cooked and then given a light saute in melted butter. I don't think they were cooked only be sauteing insofar as the lobster chunks were too tender for that. It was fabulous.

The second restaurant used chunks of cooked lobster in a mayonnaise binder. It too was very good, but I think I preferred the butter-sauteed version.

I had a fresh lobster at the Legal Sea Foods in Charles Square. They offered me the opportunity to select one from a tank, which I passed on. It was a whole steamed lobster that had been split lengthwise down the body. It, too, was truly delicious, but for a 1.25-1.50 lb. lobster, I was surprised at the yield of the meat. I would estimate that perhaps five-six ounces of meat was retrieved. Now mind you, I ate the meat from the tail, the body and cracked the claws. I noticed that some of my fellow diners were sucking the meat from the legs along the side, but darn if I could really see any meat in there. For dessert, I had something I had never heard of before: grapenut custard. It was a soft egg custard, almost pudding-like in consistency, that was served in a parfait glass. It had grapenuts cereal added in. Very interesting.

I have had the occasional lobster here in Seattle, but I have to say the one I had in Boston seemed better, based on my very small comparative sample.

[reesek]

Michael,

Most of what makes lobster so expensive is the meat to shell ratio. with that in mind, i highly recommend biting the length of the legs to extract what can be a surprisingly rewarding amount of meat. 1 1/4 lobsters are among the smallest sold.

I made lobster rolls (rather the pale-bunned facsimile) for 4th of July. I'm an Easterner myself, daughter of a Massachusetts man and I too mourn the absence of frisky lobsters in seattle. my rolls, for the record had homemade mayo with some herbs. not authentic in the least - but pretty darn good.

I have eaten excellent Maine Lobster at Etta's (a place I'm not generally wild about) though it seems all too wrong to eat lobster in a white tablecloth restaurant.

I know someone who holds a "lobster feadst" once a year. Flies lobsters in from Maine, throws newspapers on a picnic table with a couple of rocks and picks and dumps freshly steamed lobster on the newspapers. everyone brings a donation and a beverage (which must be consumed in it's container) and makes friends real fast. nothing like a little lobster fat in your eye to break the ice with strangers. i haven't ever met any of you...wonder if it's too late to get good lobster from maine...anyone interested in a feadst-type gathering?

[MGLloyd]

Michael,

Most of what makes lobster so expensive is the meat to shell ratio. with that in mind, i highly recommend biting the length of the legs to extract what can be a surprisingly rewarding amount of meat. 1 1/4 lobsters are among the smallest sold.

I made lobster rolls (rather the pale-bunned facsimile) for 4th of July. I'm an Easterner myself, daughter of a Massachusetts man and I too mourn the absence of frisky lobsters in seattle. my rolls, for the record had homemade mayo with some herbs. not authentic in the least - but pretty darn good.

I have eaten excellent Maine Lobster at Etta's (a place I'm not generally wild about) though it seems all too wrong to eat lobster in a white tablecloth restaurant.

I know someone who holds a "lobster feadst" once a year. Flies lobsters in from Maine, throws newspapers on a picnic table with a couple of rocks and picks and dumps freshly steamed lobster on the newspapers. everyone brings a donation and a beverage (which must be consumed in it's container) and makes friends real fast. nothing like a little lobster fat in your eye to break the ice with strangers. i haven't ever met any of you...wonder if it's too late to get good lobster from maine...anyone interested in a feadst-type gathering?

My wife and I would certainly be up for any kind of lobster feast in the greater Seattle area!