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Lobster Bashaws
Prepare the lobster as in the last recipe. Divide the shell into quarters, scrape these thoroughly, and sprinkle over the inside of them some fine dried bread-crumbs. Put in the mixture, cover it thickly with bread-crumbs, pour over the top a quarter of a pound of clarified butter, an ounce over each quarter, and bake in a quick oven. Serve the meat in the shells, neatly arranged on a hot napkin, and garnish with bright green parsley. If on being taken out of the oven the lobster is not sufficiently browned, hold a red-hot iron shovel over it for two or three minutes. Time, ten minutes to bake. Probable cost of a large lobster, from 2s. to 3s. Sufficient for six or seven persons.
A Victorian way of returning dressed lobster to its own shell and browning it hard on top. The instructions assume you have already made the filling from the preceding recipe in the book, which is the usual chopped lobster meat bound with butter, seasoning and a little cream or sauce.
- The missing first step"Prepare the lobster as in the last recipe" points back to a preceding recipe not reproduced here, which would have been boiled lobster picked from the shell, the meat chopped and bound with butter, seasoning and enough sauce or cream to hold it. Without that mixture there is nothing to put back in the shells, so work from any standard dressed-lobster filling.
- A quick ovenThe book gives no temperature; by the usual modern equivalence that is roughly 400-450F. Ten minutes is all the dish needs, since everything in it is already cooked; the oven is there to heat through and set the crumb crust, not to cook the lobster again.
- Don't overbakeLobster meat that has been boiled once and then held at high heat turns fibrous and squeaky. Pull the shells as soon as the crumbs are coloured, even if that is short of ten minutes.
- The red-hot shovelThe Victorian substitute for a salamander. A domestic grill or broiler, preheated and used for a minute or two, does the same job of browning the top without cooking the inside further.
- A quarter pound of clarified butterFour ounces over four quarter-shells is generous by modern taste and will pool. An ounce per quarter is what the recipe specifies, but half that gives a crisp crumb rather than a saturated one. Clarified butter stands more heat than whole butter, whose milk solids scorch.
- Dividing the shellSplit the body shell lengthways, then across, to give four boat-shaped containers. Scrape out the tomalley and any gritty matter, rinse and dry them well; damp shells steam the crumbs instead of crisping them.
- YieldSix or seven portions from one large lobster only works in the Victorian sense of a made dish among several courses. As a starter it serves four; as a main course, two.
- The hot napkinA folded linen cloth on the serving dish, which absorbs butter and stops the shells sliding. A warmed platter does the job now, though the napkin is worth keeping if you want the period effect.
"Bashaw" is the older English spelling of pasha, the Ottoman title, and it is tempting to read it, as attached to a rich, spiced, highly seasoned dish, as signalling heat and luxury rather than any actual connection to Turkish cooking rather than a documented naming habit. Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery, compiled in the 1870s for middle-class households with a cook, is full of such names, and full of lobster besides. The quoted price of two to three shillings for a large one puts it at around a labourer's daily wage in the 1870s, but within reach of the households the book addressed. Stuffing food back into its own shell was a favourite Victorian presentation, part economy and part theatre, and the red-hot shovel held over the top is a domestic improvisation on the professional salamander, the long-handled iron plate that restaurant kitchens heated in the fire to glaze the surface of a dish.