Last night, I decided I’d finally cook the lobster tail I had sitting around in my freezer. After all, what could be tastier than a nice juicy lobster tail dipped in melted butter?
I soon discovered that preparing a lobster tail for cooking is about as much fun as smashing myself in the head with vol. 6 of Ramesside Inscriptions. Even dead, lobsters manage to be nasty, grudge-wielding crustaceans that are determined to punish you for their death.
I thought I’d be fancy and ‘piggyback’ the lobster like they do in restaurants. It seemed so simple: all I needed to do was slit the shell and then gently push the meat upward. Of course, slitting the shell proved to be rather more difficult than I had anticipated, for this particular lobster must’ve eaten its Wheaties in life, giving it a well-nigh impregnable shell. I was forced to hack and saw away with a combination of knives and scissors. It wasn’t pretty. Little bits of lobster shell were flying everywhere and it seemed I was making about a nanometer’s headway for every 15 minutes of hard labor. Finally, after much effort, I managed to crack the shell all the way back to the tail and I started pushing the meat through.
Being gentle proved not to be an option. I was eventually able to push it through, but, instead of an elegant mound of lobster meat, I was presented with a ragged and torn mass that made the lobster look like a slain ingenue from a splatter film.
Thoroughly concerned by this point, I decided to pop it in the oven and hope that baking would cure all defects. When the appointed time came, I stuck my kitchen thermometer in and saw that it wasn’t quite heated through yet, so I put it in for a few more minutes. Still not heated through. When I checked a third time, it was finally done, so I sat down to enjoy my delicious lobster meal with some melted butter.
I took one bite, chewed it carefully, and decided to chuck the thing in the trash. Not only was it bland, but I also managed to overcook it, giving it a lovely rubbery consistency. All my hard work was for naught. So instead of an elegant feast fit for the elite, I ended up having cereal.
Codex Lochianus 