LOBSTER

Everybody loves lobster.
When visitors come to Cat Island, they want lobster. The restaurants always have lobster on the menu – although not always in the kitchen. There is always a demand for lobster from the fishermen on the island, and they try to accommodate as much as they can. But lobsters are cunning little creatures. They hide under rocks, they swim backwards and they don’t always congregate in the same spot as last year, so they are not that easy to catch.

There is a saying on the island: lobsters walk on top of the reefs when the moon is full and the tide is low. Then you can catch them – even from the beach.
Personally, I think this is a lot of baloney. This is because I have tried it. Not once, but several times. And I have never seen a lobster walking on the reef.

What I have seen, is an alien. Or that is actually what it looked like.
Picture this: it is midnight, the moon is full, the top of the reef is rising slowly in the valley of the waves. All you hear is the wosh, wosh of the waves and the giggles of my son and his wife who accompany me on this outing. The beach is ghostly white, and all the palm fronds are black.
All of a sudden, the reef is lit up by a turquoise light. It is just laying there, a shining blob of iridescent blue light, and I have no idea what it is.
I yell at my son to come with me and explore, and we approach it carefully. We wouldn’t have had to worry. It was a very natural phenomena. An octopus, on his nightly hunt, had turned on its flash light. But believe me – it looked like an alien.

But we didn’t get any lobsters. I didn’t really mind. I do like lobsters, but I prefer the Northern ones with claws. The Spiny lobsters, or crayfish, as they call them here, don’t have any claws and don’t taste the same. I cant really describe the taste, but in order to really enjoy the crayfish, you have to cook it carefully.

It over-cooks very easily, and then it gets woody and dry. It sometimes gets mushy, and then you have to throw it out. My brother always cuts his tails in half and puts them on a on the grill, but it does tend to make them a little too chewy.
I have experimented with different ways to cook the Spiny lobster. To begin with, you only use the tail, since the body of the lobster is fairly empty. If you want to eat it by itself, accompanied with starches, sauces and salads, I suggest you broil it. Cut the tail in half. Smother it with butter and garlic and salt. Keep the shell on, and broil it for approximately 5 minutes. Keep a close eye. It should start to get brown on top, but do not let it get black.

If you want to use it in a salad or spaghetti sauce, you want to boil it. Put the whole tail into boiling, heavily salted water, and let it boil for 5 minutes. It depends on the size, of course, and the small ones cooks faster, but I would say that after the tail has turned red, leave it boiling for another 4-5 minutes. And if you are like me, and not afraid of undercooked seafood, I like it better when the middle of the tail is slightly transparent .

If you want to get really fancy, you should cook it “sou-vide” It means in a vacuum bag in hot, but not boiling, water. It is not really that difficult and all you need is a zip lock bag and a thermometer .

Lobster sou vide, my way.

Take the tail out of the shell. One small tail per person require one small zip lock bag per tail.
Put two slices of a stick of butter in the zip lock bag together with a small amount of whatever herb you like. I prefer a little dill weed and a some slices of garlic. Put the tail in the bag and suck out the air.

Put the bags in 130 degree water for about 10 – 15 minutes. The water should be hot, but not boiling. You should still be able to put your finger in it without getting hurt.
If you don’t have a thermometer , think about this: most water heaters are set to 120 degrees, so if you make it a little hotter than the hottest tap water, its good.
Make sure the tails turn red in the first 5 minutes. If they don’t, add some minutes.