How to Cut Open a Lobster with Chef Marc Murphy

by Alex Van Buren, Posted Aug 6th 2009 @ 2:00PM

How To Remove Meat From a Lobster on Howcast

Summer leaves seafood lovers craving lobster in some incarnation, whether it be tucked into a buttery roll, scattered throughout risotto or luxuriating in the butter-cream bath of lobster Thermidor (thought to have been a favorite of Napoleon).

However you like your lobster, getting to its tender meat can be nightmarish, with spiny claws and juice flying everywhere. Not so in this excellent Howcast video, with a demonstration by chef Marc Murphy of New York City's Landmarc, who knows his way around the leggy critters. Who knew you could either snip open or crush those dastardly knuckles? Or crush the tail under a towel?

The video even ends with a quirky factoid: Boiling lobsters alive in Reggio Emilia, Italy is illegal, with violators facing fines nearing $800. We wonder how many Italians risk it!

[Via Howcast]

Filed Under: On the Blogs, Ingredients
Tags: how to, howcast, HowTo, landmarc, lobster, lobster risotto, lobster roll, lobster thermidor, LobsterRisotto, LobsterRoll, LobsterThermidor, marc murphy, MarcMurphy, shellfish, video

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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)

8-07-2009 @9:55PM Lobstah Eatah said... Obviously this guy is not from Maine. I've been eating lobster all my life and wouldn't even begin to tackle the job in this manner. Slicing the tail in half?!?! Crushing the knuckles and potentially mangling these delicious morsels, you've got to be kidding me! Put away the knife and towel, grab some lobster/nut crackers and have at it. The easiest way to remove the meat from the tail is to hold the tail flat in your hand with top against your palm, then insert a fork between the bottom of the tail shell and the meat with the tines curved toward the meat, grab onto the meat with the fork and slide out...whole. Don't forget to break off the two sets of flippers on the end of the tail...yumminess in there. Not to mention the body meat. What a joke!
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