Confessions of a Foodie

VEW

I love to cook. I love to eat. I eat just about anything and like most of it. But there are some things I have trouble with. Things that people who love food are probably not supposed to have trouble with…things that get me in trouble with fellow, more serious foodies. I write this in a spirit of gest, but I assure you it’s all true.

I have never professed an undying love of lobster. It all began when, as a 14 year old I had my first whole lobster and no one warned me that on top of water gushing everywhere upon cracking the beast open, there could also be a number of other unsavory looking things in there. So I eagerly cracked open the crimson crustacean only to lose my appetite upon seeing the green tomally that some consider the best part. I have only truly lost my appetite on two occasions, that was the first. Not wanting to disappoint my parents, who spent a considerable sum on this treat for the family, I managed to eat the lobster by dousing it in…ketchup. But that’s not the end of my lobster tale. I have grown to love lobster in stews, bisques, pastas and the like, but have never been a huge fan of whole lobsters until recently. On a weekend in Maine we had a fabulous outdoor dinner with farmstand corn on the cob, field greens just picked from the garden and Maine lobster. The lobster tasted fabulous, so much so that upon arriving home one day later, my husband and I bought some lobster to make again—our first time making them at home. The catch was that I would have to plunge them into the boiling cauldron.

Now, I have read all the recent debates about humane and inhumane killing of lobsters. I can’t say I really cared…it wasn’t going to change my mind about eating lobster and I had never actually cooked one myself…but when it came time to take the plunge, I couldn’t do it. And it wasn’t due to a twinge of guilt, it was again a fear of losing my appetite. I took the brown paper bag out of the fridge and opened it to take the first victim out…and the slow moving of the legs gave me the shivers. It is after all, a bit like picking up a giant spider, or rather looking at one because I confess I couldn’t even pick it up. It all makes me wonder who in the world originally looked at a lobster and thought, hmmm, that looks like it could have some pretty tasty meat under all that armor. Clearly not someone who was as far removed from the production of ready to prepare meats as I.

In the end I had to go back on my word and call in the reserves in the form of my husband, who being a man, did the job, but only this once he assured me with a sidelong glance that clearly said, Are you serious? It was a rare moment of weakness in the kitchen. I guess I have my work cut out for me.