Too Many Lobsters?

Most of you know of my love of Maine.  And my love of fresh lobster when we travel there.  They're delicious, incredibly fresh and really reasonable.  In September, we often got them for $4.50-$4.75 per pound.  Even in June this year, usually when the prices are higher, we bought them for $6.50 per pound.

The great news for consumers in Maine is that the prices of lobsters continue to drop.  They're about 70% below the norm and at an almost 30-year low for this time of year.  Again, great for consumers.  But not so great for the lobstermen.  Unfortunately for us here in PA, the big lobster bargains are confined to the Maine area.  Shipping the soft-shelled lobsters plentiful this time of year keep the prices higher here.

The main reason for this drop in price is the great increase in the number of lobsters crawling on the ocean floor--more than lobstermen have seen in ages.  This is the result of a number of things, not the least of which is the change in climate--the unusually warm winters that we've had, which increase the water temperature, making it a better environment for lobsters to grow. 

Then there's the overfishing of cod and haddock in waters off the Maine coast.  These fish used to patrol these waters in the millions--often time eating young lobsters.  Now their numbers are depleted--lowering the number of the lobsters' natural predators.

It's gotten so bad that some groups of lobstermen have agreed to not going out to fish so the demand (and prices) will rise.  There are some reports that some have even issued threats to others who continue to fish.  Most lobstermen say that selling their catch for anything less than $4/pound means they're losing money. 

The problem even carries over international lines.  Many Maine fishermen send a large amount of their catch to processors in Canada.  With the drop in price, these processors are buying even more from Maine.  Of course, this is a problem for the Canadian lobstermen, who have blockaded the gates of some processors in an attempt to keep trucks carrying Maine lobsters to enter.  A Canadian court has granted a 10-day injunction keeping protesters from blocking the gates--at least temporarily. 

It sounds like quite a mess.

But some lobstermen are turning to other sea creatures to earn them income.  With the drop in lobster prices, some are hoping to start a trend toward scallops.  Scallops used to be plentiful in the Maine waters--and are making a comeback in deeper waters--but have been a bit fished out closer to shore.  So some fishermen are taking a shot at farming scallops. 

Scallops aren't like mussels, which can be "grown" on strings.  Scallops have to be raised in large cages so they don't swim away.  Before scallops can be farmed commercially, though, state and federal regulations have to be set and you know how that can go.  But hopefully, this will provide a viable alternative to lobstermen as they wait for the lobster catch to get back to normal.

Read more about the drop in lobster prices in this Wall Street Journal article.  Read about the Canada vs. Maine lobster wars in this article from NPR and about farming scallops in another NPR article.

Naked Lobster

As you know, I love lobster.  When in Maine, there's nothing better than buying live lobsters, cooking and eating them right away.  Delicious.

But there are those who, even though they love to eat lobster, have a hard time with killing their dinner right in the kitchen.  Not to mention the work it takes to get to the meat.

To me, that's the Maine experience--cracking the claws, sucking the meat out of the little legs, taking a big bite of tail meat while butter drips down your chin. 

I guess not everyone agrees with me.  Many folks just want to eat the lobster meat without the killing and cracking.  That's where John Hathaway comes in.

Hathaway opened a lobster shack in Kennebunkport, ME in 2001.  You know the place--plastic bibs, disposable tablecloths on picnic tables.  But what he found was that most people don't want that experience.  They just want to eat the lobster meat.

He found out about an accidental discovery in Louisiana by an oyster distributor who, while playing around with high pressure water to kill bacteria on oysters and extend their shelf life, discovered that the high pressure spray also shucked the oysters.  Hathaway wondered how this technique might work with lobsters.  He headed South to find out.

What he found may actually revolutionize how and where lobster can be shipped and how it can be sold and served.  What happened is that the live lobsters came out of the high pressure spray with 2 differences: they were dead and the meat was totally separated from the shells, but still on the inside.  So once the shells were cracked, the raw lobster meat just slid out.

Needless to say, Hathaway has changed his business plan.  He bought a huge machine that puts the lobsters under high pressure, killing them in 6 seconds and separating the meat in 6 minutes.  He sells to people who don't want to cook and dismantle live lobsters in their homes and to restaurants that save money (and pass some of the savings on to their customers) because they don't have to have space to store live lobsters.  Lobster meat can now be shipped at much less expense (you don't have to keep the critters alive) and can spread the Maine lobster to places that haven't known it before.

For my money, I want the fun of eating a whole lobster.  But I can totally understand the appeal of cooking with raw lobster meat without the hassle.  Read more about this interesting story in this article from Boston.com.

Mainely Food

Well, it's back to reality here in PA now that we've returned from a week and a half in the great state of Maine.  It was supposed to have been a couple of days less, but as we started our trip home on Saturday, we noticed some smoke coming from under the hood of the car--bad radiator.  No one was open to fix it until Monday, so we were "stranded" in Bar Harbor for a couple of extra days. 

We didn't need the extra expense of the repair, a rental car and a motel stay, but if we were going to be stranded, better there than on some highway in the middle of Connecticut or something like that.  So we got some more good food, more time in Acadia and a long overnight drive home from 4PM on Monday to about 3AM on Tuesday.

But enough about that...here are some highlights (both food and otherwise).

Mmmm...Burgers!

We made our usual stop in Freeport to visit L.L. Bean and got some lunch at Johnny Rocket's Original Hamburgers.  It's a chain, but I must say that the burgers were delicious.  Juicy and a really good crust on the outside.  We were pleasantly surprised. 

The weather was nice--sunny and in the mid-60's as we drove north for a stay in Boothbay Harbor.  We found a nice kid-friendly B&B there a few years ago, the Bayside B&B, and have stayed there for the last few years as a stopover on our way.  Very nice people and good breakfasts. 

Tasty treats at The Lobster Dock.

Boothbay Harbor is also home to The Lobster Dock, a great waterfront seafood place where Bobby Flay had a crabcake throwdown with the owner a number of years ago and where last year, Jake learned that he loves fried Maine shrimp.  It was getting cooler, but we still ate by the water.  Jake had shrimp and MB and I shared a seafood platter.  Haddock, shrimp, scallops and clams fried to perfection, not greasy at all, tender--so good.  We usually get ice cream in Boothbay Harbor, but it was pretty cold after the sun went down (an overnight low of 36!), so we skipped it until another time.

We visited one of our favorite finds of the last few years, the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens.  I'm usually not really into that kind of thing, but I really love this place.  A must-see if you are ever in the area.  Beautifully landscaped and cared for--a children's garden based on kid's books (many from Maine authors), a Garden of the Five Senses, Rose Garden, Kitchen Garden, scenic walking paths, etc.  A really cool place.  (Yummy food in the cafeteria, too!)

What a goofball.  Wonder where he gets that.

After spending much of the day there, we headed to the cottage we rented in West Tremont--on the "Quiet Side" of Mount Desert Island, which houses Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park.  MB's brother Pete and his girlfriend, Linda, joined us.  A nice comfortable house, literally just a stone's throw to the beach of Duck Cove--it gave Jake plenty of room to search for "treasures" on the beach.   

The back of the house faces West, so it's no wonder why the place is called Acadia Sunset.  This is the view from the back porch.

Ready for the table.

Of course, we were in Maine, so we couldn't go too long without eating lobster.  Very close to the cottage is a great lobster pound, Thurston's.  We've eaten on their dockside deck in the past, but this time, we bought live critters to cook at home.  They were something like $4.65/lb for medium soft-shelled lobsters.  You can't buy a fast food dinner for that! 

And they were delicious.  I steamed them with water from the cove--perfectly seasoning them.  Tender and sweet, dipped in butter and lemon.  There's not much better.  Jake was very proud that he ate his first whole lobster.  He did a good job, too!

Stop playing with your food!

Hungry yet?  Next time: working up an appetite hiking, some presidential ice cream and our favorite restaurant.

Where's it From?



It's always good to know where your food comes from, isn't it?  If you buy locally, you can usually tell what farm your veggies came from, where the chickens were raises, where the bread was made.  But for foods that aren't local, it's a little more problematic.

If you go to a restaurant, you often don't know where they got the food they're serving you.  An exception is if you buy a lobster that was caught in Canada.


These were caught in Maine.



There's a new program among Canadian lobstermen that allows consumers to track the lobster they buy back to the fisherman who caught it.  The lobsters get their claws banded like usual, but these bands have plastic tags on it with a number specific to that lobsterman.  When you buy the critter, you can plug the number in on www.thisfish.info and find out about the fisherman, where it was caught and any other information that the fisherman wants to make available.  You can even contact them if you want. 

From the look of the website, it's just a pilot program right now.  But it looks like you can track your salmon, halibut and rockfish as well as lobster.  I don't know if it's really a necessity, but it's kind of cool, don't you think?  You can find out more by reading the article from Canada.com. 

Lotsa Lobsta

It's been reported that Maine's lobster harvest in 2010 was a record breaker.  Preliminary numbers show that 93.4 million pounds of lobster were caught in Maine waters, breaking 2009's record by over 12 million pounds.  Lobstermen get about $3.31 per pound, making this year's catch the 3rd most lucrative in history.

Still, a lobsterman's life isn't easy.  Because of the abundance of the critters, a lobsterman is only allowed by law to have one boat (as opposed to fishermen, who can own many boats).  From an article in the Portland Press Herald:

To keep their profits up, Maine lobstermen must maximize their fishing time, spending 14 hours a day hauling traps. That leaves them little or no time to sell their product, so they have largely relegated the job to lobster dealers, who pay lobstermen at the wharf and then find retailers, restaurants and other markets.

There are a number of lobstermen in Maine who are now forming cooperatives--teaming with chefs and marketing teams--in an effort to spread the delicious lobster to a wider clientele.

Much like I do as a personal chef, they are creating delicious dishes with fresh ingredients and freezing them.  Then they sell them on line or in grocery stores so people can enjoy lobster without much preparation and in a bunch of different ways.  Only about 1/5 of the lobster caught in Maine is consumed in New England, so freezing pre-made dishes not only allows folks in other parts of the country to enjoy it, but it gives other options to locals.

For my money, I still think that the best way to eat a lobster is fresh out of the water, steamed or boiled, with some lemon and butter. Not that I'd turn away something like lobster pizza, chowder or pasta. And that's what these co-ops are counting on.

It's All About ME (continued)

Clam shacks are the classic way to eat seafood in Down East Maine.  They usually have a walk-up window, a huge menu and very fresh seafood.  Most offer things like burgers and hot dogs (for some reason) and picnic tables (some even have indoor seating).  They usually do a great job with fried foods as well as fresh lobsters, steamed clams and mussels, etc.

You've heard me talk about Red's Eats in Wiscasset and The Lobster Dock in Boothbay Harbor.  Another place we've been to--maybe the best of them--is Bagaduce Lunch in Brooksville.  They've been closed for the season by the time we've gotten there the last few years. 



More fried shrimp at The Fish Net.



In Blue Hill, the "town" near the cottage (as opposed to the "village" of Brooklin), there's an excellent shack, The Fish Net.  By this time, MB's mom, brother and his girlfriend had joined us and we all went there for dinner--another chance for Jake to scarf down some fried Maine shrimp.  Among other things devoured that night--scallop roll (lightly fried scallops on a toasted hot dog bun), fish chowder, seafood stew, lobster roll.  There's just something about eating that kind of food at a picnic table with others doing the same--out under the clear sky having your legs eaten by mosquitoes.  OK, the last part isn't that great, but everything else is.  Nothing a little Off can't take care of.

While we were there, a lobsterman (part of the family who owns The Fish Net) brought some lobsters to our table for a bit of a tutorial about them.  It got us anticipating cooking our own the next night.  He was very nice and obviously enjoyed telling people about the critters.  He said that it was a great year for lobsters, which, I'm sure made him even happier.



Baseball by the sea.



For years, we had passed signs for Moose Point State Park on our way to Blue Hill or Bar Harbor and this year, we decided to check it out.  It's a very nice park--on the water with some nice paths to walk and nice lawns for playing baseball with Jake.  Apparently, moose have never been seen at Moose Point (some say they've seen droppings).  We saw neither.

From there we stopped at a very nice potter co-op and visited Perry's Nut House (I tried to link thei4r website, but not surprisingly, the site doesn't come up).  This place is, well, just plain weird.  Real stuffed wildlife, very expensive fudge and nuts, a while bunch of junky toys and souvenirs, a real mummy, fun house mirrors and much more.  Jake thought it was great--as have visitors since 1927.  I guess it's one of those places to stop in one time to say you were there. 



Getting the water for cooking
the bugs.



Lobsters.  They're what you think of when you think of Maine--especially if you're hungry.  We bought a bunch at The Sleigh Bell Shoppe/Lobster Crate.  We're used to this place after all these years, but it's still pretty funny.  It's a nice little gift shop that happens to sell lobsters, too.  A very nice lady, Annette, runs it and is always very friendly. 

The cottage has a turkey fryer that we cook the lobsters in.  I simply fill the pot with sea water, crank the propane and get it boiling.  Then it's time for the bugs to take a swim and about 15 minutes later, we're eating.  The sea water seasons them perfectly.  We also picked mussels at low tide and I cooked them with some bacon, white wine and mustard.  They were really tasty even if some of them were gritty with little "pearls".  (That's what happens when you pick your own mussels.  Most that you buy or have in a restaurant are farmed and grow on strings, so sand doesn't get in and pearls can't form.)

It was quite a feast.  Jake was all excited about eating lobster this year (he had tasted it only 1 other time at Red's Eats), but didn't like the messiness of it.  Maybe next year.  Butter, lemon, wine, beer, salad and that great bread from the farmers' market.  Pretty much the perfect dinner.

We bought a few extras for a great lobster stew that I make.  But I'll tell you about that next time.



Ready to go to the table!