How to Crack a Lobster

Lobster a la carte

To some, lobsters remain intimidating aquatic arachnids, looking more like surly sea spiders than anything you'd venture to capture and eat. However, the Maine lobster yields a delicacy of sweet meat and is the center of a $250 billion industry. Patience and perseverance are required for the catch and most would agree the same could be said for the dining experience. Wear a bib and use a few tools of the trade and you’ll be cracking the lobster code in no time and handsomely rewarded with a palatable taste sensation.

Things You'll Need

• Bib
• Lobster claw cracker or nutcracker
• Lobster pick
• Sharp butcher's knife

Instructions

1. Boil the lobster. While lobsters can also baked or broiled, the point is to cook the creature before you try to crack it.

2. Tie a bib around your neck; this is a messy adventure.

3. Grip the lobster, with one hand on its body and another on its tail. Twist and pull, separating the one from the other.

4. Hold the body in one hand and one of the lobter’s claws (or chelipeds) in the other. Using the same twist and pull motion as above, snap the claw from the body.

5. Repeat for the second claw.

6. Separate the claw from the knuckle by snapping it like a twig.

7. Separate the two pieces of the claws from one another at the joint

8. 

   Use a lobster cracker (or nut cracker) to crack the large claw just below its tip. Repeat for second claw.

9. Use the cracker to open knuckles.

10. Hold the tail, underside up, with two hands gripping in a horizontal line. Pull your hands down and away from one another, cracking the tail and releasing the meat. If you have difficulty with this motion, you can use a butcher’s knife to slit the underside open first.

11. 

    Pull the small legs from the body; the meat from these appendages is taken out with a lobster fork or sucked out by the eater.

Tips & Warnings

• Fishermen and chefs agree that lobsters must be cooked live.