Adventures in seafood

So Saturday I visited my friend where she made seafood dinner (graphic shellfish alert!) and we watched two movies.

She made garlic shrimp and boiled lobstah, and served with corn on the cob. Yum! It was my fourth time eating lobster, and the first time I ever ripped my own. The first time it was at my ex-in-laws’ house, the second was on vacation in Maine, and my hubby at the time did the ripping for me at both. All I had to do was dip in butter and enjoy. My hands hardly got dirty at all. The third time was at some fancy-schmancy holiday party with MB, where the tail and claws were served to me in a creamy sauce on a huge plate by a be-jacketed waiter, along with an amazing filet mignon. (Phew! That was some party!)

But this time… this time, my hands were sliced by the critter’s sharp edges and shell and I had more than a little trouble. When I ripped the claws off, my plate was flooded with lobster water. That was rather a surprise. I couldn’t look at the thing in the face, either. Lobsters are ugly! And this was a big one – 1.75 pounds. It sure wasn’t a chicken lobster!

So first she showed me how to suck out the meat from the legs (I remembered this part). I did one and left the rest on the body. I could have gone back to them, but I was full by the time I finished. (In retrospect, I would eat those first and save the other pieces for later.) Then I learned how to crack the claws, which were yummy. Then she expected me to rip the tail from the body, which I did, but I hated it. I got all stressed out and with the enormous tail in one hand and the disgusting body in the other, I freaked out a little and she allowed me to dump the body right into the garbage bowl. I found my way to the tail meat, which was huge, and jabbed at the body a few times, leaving the disgusting green yeast-infection-reminiscent tomalley inside, where it belonged. I did not endeavor to poke around its head, either. Maybe another time, with the right lobster.

I asked my mom about why I was all scraped up from the thing (since she did not always keep kosher – growing up, vacations and weekends on the boat yielded lobster dinners from Long Island Sound, whenever they felt like it) and she explained that there are special lobster-cracking tools that make it easy to get into these bottom-dwellers. She said the reason I had such trouble was because I used a nutcracker and fork instead of a lobster cracker and specialized scissors. At least we had tiny lobster forks to get the meat out (in my house, these are considered olive forks, haha).

When dinner was over, we watched The Happening and Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street. The Happening was more goofy than scary, but Sweeney Todd was awesome! I just love Johnny Depp. Remember 21 Jump Street? Sigh. Anyway, the movie was dark, funny, musical, took place in a different country, and the acting was superb. I recommend!

Then I went home and crashed. And slept late. I had a weird dream, but it wasn't scary or anything. It involved dancing and turning, but I didn't recognize the person I was dancing with. I also weighed in, and found that I had gained back 2.2 pounds. That's not so good. I really think it has to do with retaining water weight -- Aunt Flo a'comin' -- since even though I overdid it one day and ate food, I certainly did not overeat enough calories or fat last week to have gained anything = back, mathematically speaking at least. So even though I gained, I am looking at this week as a fresh and new time for me. Here goes!