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Plain-Baked Live Lobsters
Cut off near the body the large and small claws of three small lobsters, one pound each. Split the bodies into two even halves, crack the claws with a cleaver and remove the stony pouch; season the bodies with a half teaspoon salt and a half teaspoon paprika; spread a tablespoon oil over the bodies; place the large claws and bodies on a roasting tin and set in the oven for twenty-five minutes. Remove, dress the lobsters on a large dish, decorate with a little parsley greens and six "quarters" of lemon and serve.
A brisk, unfussy treatment that depends entirely on not overcooking the meat. The original assumes you know how to break down a live lobster and what heat a roasting oven holds.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given at all. Twenty-five minutes for a one-pound lobster suggests a hot oven, somewhere around 425-450F; at 350F the shells will not colour and the meat steams rather than roasts.
- Dispatching the lobsterThe lobster must be killed before it goes in the pan, not baked alive. Drive the point of a heavy knife straight down through the head, just behind the eyes, then split from there through the tail. Chilling the lobster in the freezer for 15 minutes first makes it sluggish and easier to handle.
- The stony pouchThis is the gastric mill, the grit-filled stomach sac sitting just behind the eyes. Lift it out with your fingers along with the thread of dark intestine running down the tail. The green tomalley and any coral roe are edible and traditionally left in place.
- TimingTwenty-five minutes is long by current standards for a one-pound split lobster; 12-15 minutes at 450F is usually enough, and the tail meat is done the moment it turns opaque and firm. Beyond that it tightens and goes fibrous.
- Cracking the clawsCrack, do not shatter. One firm blow with the back of a cleaver on each side of the claw lets heat and seasoning in and lets the diner pull the meat out whole. Splinters driven into the meat are the usual result of over-enthusiasm.
- Oil and seasoningA tablespoon of oil across three lobsters is thin cover. Brushing the cut faces with melted butter partway through basting keeps the exposed meat from drying, and the paprika here is for colour on the shell as much as for flavour.
- YieldThree one-pound lobsters serve three as a main course or six as a first course. Small lobsters suit this treatment: they cook evenly at this heat, where a two-pounder would want lower heat and longer.
Split-and-roasted lobster belongs to the era when the crustacean had only recently stopped being cheap. Lobster was abundant enough along the North Atlantic coast in the early nineteenth century that it is often said to have been fed to prisoners, servants and livestock, and it was certainly used as bait and fertiliser; canning and rail transport opened up inland markets over the course of the century and carried it into hotel and restaurant territory, which is where a dish like this one lives. "Plain-baked" distinguishes it from the elaborate alternatives a general cookery book of this period would be likely to carry as well: lobster Newburg, lobster à l'américaine, lobster in a cream-bound gratin. Here the shell serves as its own roasting vessel, the parsley and lemon quarters supply the whole garnish, and the cook is trusted to know when the meat is set.