It's too late, now, though. Yes, dear reader – that is a lobster without its shell, perfectly shucked. I did it yesterday while watching an episode of Battlestar Galactica.
Just kidding – this is not normally possible without the help of new, special technology. I most certainly didn't do this with my bare hands. Even the best shucker of seashells by the seashore isn't this deft with their digits. (Here's the story that inspired this post.)
The dream of anyone who eats lobster, it's done by a special machine originally designed by the military to more efficiently pack MRE's. The contraption increases the water pressure to levels greater than the deepest depths of any ocean, such that the meat – when someone thought to put a lobster inside it – is perfectly separated from the shell.
How humane is this, you wonder? Well, the idea is that this kills the lobster "in seconds," whereas the traditional Spanish Inquisition method of boiling live lobster generally has them screaming in the pot for minutes at a time.
Why is this on my blog? Well, for those of you who have lived in Korean households in the American Midwest, you probably have a mom who went to the Korean store and brought home a live lobster, much to the horror and consternation of your friends. You felt really bad for the lobster as it went in the pot, and probably thought Mom to be one cruel mama, but yet you ate it anyway.
And it was goooood.
So this brings back memories. Horrible, tasty memories. I am all at once disgusted, yet getting very hungry, looking at the picture. Compressed in this?!
Sweet Mary and Joseph! "The Fresher Under Pressure H687L System." That's out of control.
But it makes for a whole lotta lobster to go with the butter. And it makes Mom's boiling of brown lobsters alive, until they were race car red, seem not so horrifying. Except that dying in the machine above is supposed to be better than dying in the pot. The issue is still under investigation.
