As I've mentioned, I'm from New England. I'm not only of those Mayflower types, far from it, but I do identify as a New Englander. A lot of people are really enamored of lobster and are willing to pay crazy prices for it. Well, due to the recession and what I understand to be a glut of lobster this past year, I saw most places selling lobster at $3.99/lb and one place at $2.99/lb. Unfortunately, I don't really care much for crustaceans. They're pretty good, but kind of a weird texture in all the species I've tried.
Anyway, the post about "how many animals a vegetarian saves" got me thinking about lobster. In the link I posted, it mentions the largest lobster ever caught. According to some sources, lobsters have the potential to live, if not indefinitely under ideal conditions, certainly for a very, very long time. Though the lobster in the linked article was impossible to attribute an age to, just imagine how much longer a lobster would have to live to achieve the size of the largest lobster on record, which according to [The Lobster Institute] is as follows:
- 1977 -- Largest lobster, according to Guiness Book of World Records, caught off Nova Scotia. It was listed as 44 lbs 6 oz with a length, from the tip of its tail to the tip of its crusher claw, at 3 ½ feet.
3 ½ feet! As much as I enjoy eating meat and seafood, it does pain me to understand that human predation and consumption is the major contributor to the decline in flora and fauna world wide.
I just went to a medical conference with my wife and they served lobster one evening. It was hilarious to look around and see all the people there trying to figure out how to eat the lobster and not get dirty. -Pretty difficult. There were no hammers or crackers on the table but eventually, one brave soul at my table took the butt of his butter-knife and started whacking at the claw. Within a 30 seconds you could hear the same whacking sound from all of the other tables. I think Lobster is by far the most over-rated food out there. I've had some really fantastic lobster too and it can be good, but there are so many better things to eat, even in the crustacean family. I'll take King Crab over Lobster almost any day. If you put a good burrito and a lobster tail in front of me, I'd take the burrito. A burrito has the added advantage of never making me feel like I'm eating a giant water-insect.
Help me out here. Exactly what type of place serves un-cut lobsters with no cracking utensils? That just seems bizarre to me.It was hilarious to look around and see all the people there trying to figure out how to eat the lobster and not get dirty. -Pretty difficult. There were no hammers or crackers on the table but eventually, one brave soul at my table took the butt of his butter-knife and started whacking at the claw.
It was bizarre. The tails were cut, but not the claws and frankly, a lot of people consider the claw/knuckle the best meat. It was a banquet facility at a large resort in the Outer Banks. You could tell that the organizers of the conference were none too pleased with the lack of preparation.
Most people's familiarity with lobster is from a "surf and turf" type of plate. Often, this is a previously frozen lobster tail and a piece of select or even "no roll" 4-6 oz cow tender served with some shitty, from a box, demi glacé. This ubiquitous plate has informed the American consumer that "the tail" must he where it's at. Much more flavor in the claw and knuckle, much more work too get at though and Joe the Plumber doesn't want to "work for his meal". Roger Daltrey on the other hand...he "farms for his meals." Sorry, I was just listening to Baba O'riley.
Ah yes, the "lobster roll". Also, from Wikipedia Some people say that prisoners weren't allowed to be fed lobster more than three times a week as it constituted cruel and unusual punishment. Maybe, maybe not.Prior to this time, lobster was considered a mark of poverty or as a food for indentured servants or lower members of society in Maine, Massachusetts and the Canadian Maritimes, and servants specified in employment agreements that they would not eat lobster more than twice per week.
Um, seriously. Cut it out about CNN and lay off already. If not for their hard hitting journalism, how would I find out how Obama "schools" (their word not mine) his hecklers, or this $98 stump of wood for hipsters, or even whether or not Brad Pitt suffers from "face blindness". Seriously dude, if you just want to unplug and remain ignorant that's your deal, but you don't have to mock those of us who actually give a shit.
True dat. I was watching a documentary a couple weeks ago where CNN in its infancy played a prominent role. What a shame. They sort of started out as a groundbreaking paradigm shifting alternative to network news, better on basically every front except technical polish. They ended up as something far worse. More profitable I'm sure, but far worse.