Friday, November 7, 2008

lobster feast in these hard economic times


as one of my favorite things in the world is food, i will write about my dinner this evening. LOBSTER!!! i live in maine so some might think that lobster is a no brainer. but in truth the price of lobster usually puts lobster in the special treat realm. but going along with this big economic crisis, lobsters are pretty damned cheap.
well, kind of. as one drives around portland there are many fish markets and they all have their price for lobster posted outside. the signs currently read 'lobster $3.99/lb'. but once you get in the store you realized that means chicken lobsters, or lobsters under 1 and a 1/4 lb lobsters. by the time you make it up to a 1 and 1/2 lb lobster it is $5.99/lb. and that is for soft shell lobster. hard shell are still quite pricey, starting at $8.99/lb for a smallish lobster.
soft shell means they just recently molted and so there new shell is soft. this is the type of lobster that is used in processing lobster meat. and here lies the cause of the low lobster costs. the processing plants can't get credit, so they can't buy lobsters from the fishermen. so the market is flooded with lobsters and they are cheap.
but i was writing about my lobster dinner tonight. well, seth and i went ahead and bought culls. culls are lobsters missing one claw and they are always cheap. we actually learned this tip from seth's high school buddy, damian, who is a lobster fisherman on cape cod. the culls cost $3.50/lb and we got 3. plus a six-pack of geary's hampshire special ale and it cost us a grand total of $21.66! for a lobster dinner, people! and we each got a tail and a half, which is truly the sweetest meat of the lobster. we just steamed those buggers up and made a nice tossed salad. free range fish and lobster was unfortunately out of bread so we went without but we did melt a little cabot butter to dredge our lobster meat in. delicious!

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