We cooked our first fresh Caribbean Spiny Lobster recently. A couple of local fishermen came by the boat the other day offering them up. Heidi bought a 3 pounder ... quite large, indeed, although dealing with them is a bit of a different process than in Maine. And, while they don't have any claws, like Maine lobsters, they have huge tails filled with meat! Their antennae are supposed to be pretty meaty at the base, and I learned also that almost every part of the body is edible, as well, except the lungs and eyeballs. The tomale is always a risk (I loved it in Maine, but passed here ... for now).

Apparently, the best way to cook them is grilling, but of course, that means one has to kill it first. In Maine, I always just threw them into boiling water, but here I had to do what I always avoided in Maine ... stab it in the head, right behind the eyes, and cut down between the eyes, cleaving its head in two. This is supposed to instantly kill it. Well, you've all heard of the "chicken with his head cut off," right? While the lobster didn't crawl all over the galley workspace, it did start to walk away. I was aghast! I thought he was supposed to be dead now! Heidi quickly informed me that it's probably just residual nerve reflexes and he really is dead. She then admitted that was the only way she could actually deal with what she was witnessing. I agreed.

I then promptly pulled off his tail, as instructed by an expat working on our teak at the time, so as not to contaminate the tail meat with the black liquid that would surely flow from his body, and cut it in half for grilling. Unfortunately, I didn't think to take a picture of the intact lobster before I did all that damage, so for picture viewing, parental guidance is advised, but the tails do look quite yummy!

Back to Heidi's proclamation that the movement was indeed nerve reflexes. I proved that one correct. Right before I basted the tails with butter and set them grilling, I had cut off the two large antennae to cook (hence their absence in the photo) and get the meat from the base area. I stood in shock as the two four-inch pieces of antenna (they were originally about 16" long to the tips) set on the grill, each slowly twitching on the grates as if they were dancing together. Wow! But the tails were delicious! Next time, we'll be a little more organized about the entire process.

Cheers
Dennis