Lobster Fishing

We have always had a few lobster pots in Kerry. We throw them every summer and do alright for ourselves. We catch the odd lobster and plenty of edible crabs.
The idea is simple enough, get a lobster pot, tie a rope to it with a buoy attached to the end and then throw it into the sea somewhere that is good and rocky! We bait ours with mackerel and generally leave them out overnight. The following day you lift the pots and hope you have a nice lobster in there rather than an angry conger eel.

Once you have caught your lobster keep him in a bucket of sea water and try not to give him a name like my girlfriend once did. It made it all the harder to eat "Larry" that evening for dinner!
The prescribed way of cooking lobster is to put your live lobster in the freezer for 20 minutes, while he is in the freezer boil up a big pot of salted water. Pop the lobster into the water and simmer for about 15 minutes for the first pound and if you are lucky enough to catch a really big one 10 minutes per additional pound.

My favorite thing to do with a lobster is make the classic French dish, Lobster thermidor.

Here is what you need for 2 people:

1 lobster about 1kg

half an onion finely chopped,

20g butter

half glass of white wine

200ml of bechamel sauce ( just google bechamel and there are loads of really good recipes)

1 teaspoon of English mustard

Sprig of tarragon, chopped

50g Gruyere cheese or cheddar at a push.

pinch of cayenne pepper
salt and pepper

Cook the lobster as described above. Split the lobster length ways. To do this turn him on his back and cut through with a sharp heavy knife. Scoop out the meat from the tail and the brown meat from the head. Remove the nasty bits from the head so that you are left with two empty shell halves.

Sweat the onions with the butter in a frying pan until soft and then add the wine. Reduce until you are left with a tablespoon of liquid. Stir in the bechamel sauce along with the tarragon and mustard and simmer for a minute or two. Take off the heat and add three quarters of the cheese, the cayenne pepper and the lobster meat. Season with salt and pepper and mix well. Next simply fill the empty shells with the mixture and top off with the remaining cheese. Pop under a hot grill until brown and bubbling.