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I killed...

post #1 of 31
10/15/08 at 5:25pm
Thread Starter 
... my first lobster last week. No *****-footing around, knife straight through the head and swiftly back down through the body then turned it around and sliced through the head. :lips:

I killed a few langoustines last year in almost the same manner except we were taught to go through the head first with those. :smiles:

I had different tutors for those lessons though so I guess it's just a matter of preference?!? Any thoughts/guidance? :confused:

EDIT- What's wrong with p ussy-footing?:confused:
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post #2 of 31
10/15/08 at 8:41pm
hmmm maybe because the brain is in the head - you know - that thing with all the nerve receptors? If someone cut thru your tail before killing your brain, you'd prob not be happy :)

how about chilling them down in the freezer first then boom into boiling water? Is supposed to put them to sleep nicely without releasing any stress chemicals into the meat which make it taste, well, not as good as it could. And when you're paying the high price for those items, its good to make the most of them.

DC
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post #3 of 31
10/16/08 at 7:30am
Killing lobsters, yes you are going to find that there are many "right" and "only" ways to do the dead. I'm not a fan of boiling the whole beast, cooking times on different parts vary too much. I also don't care to cut through the live lobster, too many issues with shell shrapnel for my taste. I generally tear the tail off, then claws and knuckles and cook each separately. There is no nice way to do it. I however an somewhat allergic to lobster so I think of it as revenge for many trips to the hospital.

--Al
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post #4 of 31
10/16/08 at 7:58am
Don't you love it when the tail still twiches when it sits on the cutting board?

ick!
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post #5 of 31
10/16/08 at 9:26am
you want to get the head so they don't release ANY ammonia into the meat.

I go crabbing every year and I always freeze them
boil a pot of water with a pinch of salt and a bottle of yuengling and then drop them in.
my gf just splits them open while alive (and it does make for sweeter meat) but I can't be bothered doing that to something that could pinch my finger off so
i'm a fan of sedate and boil.
I don't imagine lobsters are much different
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post #6 of 31
10/16/08 at 12:18pm
I usually slice the head first, to make sure its dead and doesn't suffer, and then after it stops twitching turn it around and do the rest.
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post #7 of 31
10/16/08 at 12:33pm
Well timed thread for me, as my son and i have just witnessed yesterday, in a Carfour supermarket in Dubai , a display of live lobster without their claws?????????

I know this has nothing to do with killing them, but we were horrified that a) they had had their claws ripped off while alive and surely they are suffering
And b) Why???
And c) from a purely culinary point of view, why??? we need the claws and where are they?
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post #8 of 31
10/16/08 at 12:44pm
there be cold water lobster and there be warm water lobster - many names around the world - and the warm water types aka Mediterranean - got no claws, ala Maine lobster, to get ripped off.....

oh, methinks they also don't taste quite the same, but . . .
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post #9 of 31
10/16/08 at 12:52pm
Spiny lobsters don't have claws either, well, not the real big claws anyway
:roll:
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post #10 of 31
10/16/08 at 12:52pm
Hey Dillbert,
I never knew that there was a lobster wot got no claws. One lives and learns... Maybe thats what they were?
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post #11 of 31
10/16/08 at 1:09pm
yup. was a surprise to me first time I saw them in the Med. "langusta" and alternate spellings is often applied - but I have zilch Arab country(ies) experience in the nomenclature.

as abefroman pointed out, there's a number of critters that _look_ like "lobster" (as does a shrimp, under magnification....) but are not what nor'east coasters think of as "a lobster"
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post #12 of 31
10/16/08 at 5:01pm
Considering the fact that lobsters are related to insects there isn't much brain there to begin with. I have filleted many a walleye that was still flopping and fresh from the lake. Its all a part of food prep that people need to get used to. I have killed and butchered hogs, cattle, deer, small game...... :lol: to many people live to remote from how food is harvested.
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post #13 of 31
10/16/08 at 6:57pm
They can also regrow lost limbs so they might be harvesting limbs and letting them regrow new ones while the tail gets bigger?

Phil
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post #14 of 31
10/17/08 at 1:51pm

OOOOh! thats just freaky mungus
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post #15 of 31
10/18/08 at 12:33am
I think that's how they do snow crab claws, for example: you harvest the one big claw and throw the thing back to grow a new one.

I keep seeing the suggestion that holding the lobster by the tail and dipping the head, up to about 1" behind the eyes, into rapidly boiling water kills them very fast, with the advantage that you don't have to worry about whether you might have actually missed the brain/spinal column with your knife. I have also seen it said that putting them in the freezer, as someone suggested, actually slows them down not because they go to sleep but because they start to suffocate. I have no idea whether these things are true, though -- just passing them along.
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post #16 of 31
10/18/08 at 10:29am
FLORIDA Stonecrabs typical example, Pull off claw,throw back it regrows then reharvest in a year,
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post #17 of 31
10/26/08 at 6:32pm
Thread Starter 
Sorry for bumping this back up. I know how annoying it can be to rehash old topics but I should have explained.:crazy:

Boiling was out of the question. We were making lobster bisque so we needed the shells. Disappointing as it was to use them for such a lowly dish, these were whole, hale lobsters, not cripples.:cry:

The tutor wanted us to get used to the fact that we mostly kill what we eat and chefs need to play as big a role as any farmers, fishermen or abattoir workers. We DID get them as cold as possible first though.

I was just a bit dubious as to whether his method (through the tail then the head) was considered "the norm" or even "acceptable" in this day and age, you know? Is there any unwritten rule as to whether you should go in head first or not. :roll:
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post #18 of 31
10/26/08 at 6:36pm
You should put them in the freezer for 15 minutes, so they die painlessly, then cut them.
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post #19 of 31
12/23/09 at 1:49pm
u can easily kill the animal quickly before filleting, etc..the suffering is not necessary.
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post #20 of 31
12/23/09 at 2:15pm
I use DC's meathod.
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post #21 of 31
9/4/10 at 7:33pm

I had apprehensions about going into this week in culinary school: It is crustacean week, and though we aren't forced to kill our own lobsters, I really felt like this was something I need to learn to do to be the best possible chef. I really appreciate all the opinions on the subject, and I know I can do this now. Thanks again!

 

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post #22 of 31
9/6/10 at 9:03am

Interesting about the lobsters. You know that the warm water lobsters are not actually lobsters? They are more closely related to craw fish. I've hunted them in the keys, there we just call them bugs. When harvesting the tails, a filet knife cut on either side of the tail inside the carapace severs the attached ligaments. Then a quick twist and the tail is pulled off with any of the back meat with it. You use one of the antanae to de-vein the tail. The lobsters go back into the water feeling a little funny.. where they become food for other parts of the ocean ecosystem. Florida lobster doesn't taste anything like the Maine lobster, I wish it did as I prefer the sweet meet of a Main lobster myself. Florida lobster is more like a shrimp texturally and flavor wise. Here are about 60 that we harvested in our first day out a couple years back..

 

Florida Lobsters

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post #23 of 31
9/6/10 at 1:19pm

Main Lobster is the echelon. Florida' are stringy and a bit tough.Also cheaper

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post #24 of 31
9/8/10 at 9:23pm

Wow.  Never realized there were so many methods to killing a lobster.  Feeling compelled to throw my two cents in on this one.  Grew up a couple of towns south of Boston and shore dinners were always a summertime favorite. We had 2 lobstermen on our street, and they never used a knife for any part of the prep work.  Dropped the whole thing into a pot of boiling water or a lobster steamer (sort of like a double boiler with holes in the larger top part and a spigot on the bottom half for drawing off the broth when using it to cook steamers.)  Never noticed any off-tastes from ammonia or any other stress related chemicals/hormones.

 

The supermarket I worked at as a kid had a steamer for cooking lobsters.  Simple barrel shaped device with a door on the end and a tray that slid in.  Load it up with live and kicking lobsters and turn it on.  15 minutes later you're having a tasty dinner.  For what it's worth, Larsen's Market in Menemsha, Martha's Vineyard steams them this way, whole and live, fresh from the boat out back.  You get your steamed lobster hot with the shell intact.

 

Keeping the shell intact also ensures you get all of the tamale (sic), arguably the best part of the lobster.  (And the only liver I like.)

 

Some people say that you can stand them on their heads and when their tail curls under they are asleep and you can drop them into the pot with minimal splashing.  I've tried it and it works, but totally unnecessary. 

 

BTW, the one-clawed and clawless lobsters (Maine lobsters) are called culls in NE and are cheaper than a chicken lobster per pound, but not very popular.

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post #25 of 31
9/9/10 at 11:32am

when i was cooking on boats in the caribbean, we caught lobsters all the time for the guests...at night if you do night dives, the ocean floor is literally a carpet of lobsters...its when they move around and are easy pickins'....being a boat, we never had any freezer space to put the lobbies in to sleep, so it was always right between the eyes with a very sharp filleting knife, and then a bit of a twist...kinda gross when you think of it, but not as horrible as the pot of boiling water method...that truly is just sick...who do you think the first one was to think of even eating a lobster? i like the caribbean lobsters(spiny) over maine actually...think they are sweeter...actually, my favorite to eat is the stone crab, plus they don't have to kill the whole creature, they just take off one claw...that's really sick actually if you think about it...all those crabs moving around on the bottom of the ocean with just one claw.!!!..think that's maybe why they call some kitchen lines are called a  'crab crawl'?....good day all

joey

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post #26 of 31
9/9/10 at 1:05pm

Joey in Florida you are now allowed to pull off both their claws (I wonder if the crabs still feel their claws even after they are gone!). They claim that the crabs then are forced to eat algae and that they have not found that it increases mortality rates. I'm not sure how that study was done exactly, the FWC still suggests on the site to leave the crab with one claw for defense if nothing else.

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post #27 of 31
9/9/10 at 7:18pm


Quote:
Originally Posted by eastshores View Post

Joey in Florida you are now allowed to pull off both their claws (I wonder if the crabs still feel their claws even after they are gone!). They claim that the crabs then are forced to eat algae and that they have not found that it increases mortality rates. I'm not sure how that study was done exactly, the FWC still suggests on the site to leave the crab with one claw for defense if nothing else.

what about crab neurosis? god, i can't believe  florida would even allow that, but hey look at the 'good pastor' in gainesville...go figure that one out...sick, twisted f**k....southern baptist, gag me with a spoon, taking advantage of lonely old people crap...aargh, don't even get me started on those snake oil salesman evangelist mentality sorts...still sorry for the crabs, if that's true...please tell me its not!!! please..

joey
 

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post #28 of 31
9/9/10 at 8:05pm

Chris- I think you meant Stone Crab not Snow Crab which is harvested much the same as Dungeness or King Crab. Stonies are relived of largest claw each season and the live crab must be returned to the ocean..in S. Fla. we call it the gift that keeps on giving. Stones  most often claim the highest price of any American crab in any given year.

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post #29 of 31
9/9/10 at 8:54pm


 

Quote:
Originally Posted by durangojo View Post



what about crab neurosis? god, i can't believe  florida would even allow that, but hey look at the 'good pastor' in gainesville...go figure that one out...sick, twisted f**k....southern baptist, gag me with a spoon, taking advantage of lonely old people crap...aargh, don't even get me started on those snake oil salesman evangelist mentality sorts...still sorry for the crabs, if that's true...please tell me its not!!! please..

joey
 


I wouldn't lie to ya! http://myfwc.com/rulesandregs/Saltwater_Regulations_recstonecrab.htm  you can read there, as I said it is lawful although FWC still encourages individuals to leave the crab with one claw. The FWC is fairly involved in research studies to help maintain the large seafood resource that our state has. And please don't judge Florida because of stories you've seen on the national news. Just like any other state, the stories you hear are the sensationalized Jerry Springer form of drama that somehow the majority of television watching Americans show approval for via ratings.

 

Florida is beautiful. We're surrounded by ocean, and yet we have large hardwood forests, sandy pine forests, hundreds of freshwater rivers, creeks, and lakes, prairies, agriculture, vineyards, etc. My father was born here in my great grandmothers home. The people here are good hearted, although you might not know that from watching TV.

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post #30 of 31
9/10/10 at 7:39am

sorry about the rant eastshores, but i did live in florida for about 10 years, and had lots of great times spent on the water, in the water and eating lots of fresh seafood...i know florida as not just fodder for the news.....yes florida is a beautiful diverse state,especially older parts of the gulf coast, just filled with some real cracker head mentality and old people...but great fish...man, what i wouldn't do for a grouper sandwich right about now.....

joey

sorry, what i meant to say was that the crackerhead mentality sits in government, not in the people of the great state of florida


Edited by durangojo - 9/10/10 at 11:18am
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