Cooking lobsters for lobster macaroni cheese (lobster mac n cheese)

Careful what you post on the blog - someone might just see it.I made the Lobster mac n cheese above back in January as a one off. Well it was a going to be a one off. But when the host of of the murder mystery/ birthday at Littleton Manor near Evesham last Saturday saw it that was what they chose (along with the beef and nettle olive).... how can you resist? As it was to be a main course we served a whole lobster per portion. After the evening delivery and set up of the marquee kitchen tent the other side of Worcetser for the next day it was back to the kitchen for the second round late into Saturday morning. No finished picture from the night as we forgot the camera (so much going on), but this is how it started......

Delivered live. They have to be cooked live - they decay so quickly once they die. If you cook them dead the meat inside becomes an unusable puree.

Taking a 'warm bath' - 10 minutes. Plenty of salt - brings out the sweetness of the lobster meat.

Cooked. Don't run under cold water - it makes the meat stick to the shell so you'll never get it out from the shell without destroying it. Cut in half. Then remove and seperate knuckles and claws. The roe can be kept and added to the sauce (heaps of extra flavour and colour).

Reminds me of the days we would do them by the hundred. The meat from the knuckles and claws should be taken out while the lobster is still warm. If you fridge it first, like dunking them in cold water, the meat sticks to the shell and you will end up with a tragedy - dealing with lobster needs respect.... and time.

Job done c. 23:15. You can clean the meat in warm water to remove solidified fat. The knuckle meat goes in the head part of the shell with the claw on top.

A few hours later at 7am I was smoking chicken, and I couldn't help thinking how good smoked lobster would be. Next time......

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The ultimate mac 'n cheese challenge #2- Lobster thermidor macaroni cheese aka Lobster mac

I don't know if this is the ultimate mac 'n cheese, but it sure is the best one I've ever made!
I came accross the idea for Lobster mac 'n cheese here on Foodista somewhere near the begining of December. Adding lobster to macaroni cheese - what could be better? A couple of weeks after that along came Fiona Beckett's mac 'n cheese challenge. It seemed like the perfect opportunity. But googling for lobster 'n mac pics I couldn't understand why they were all in bowls or ramekins -why had noone used the lobster shell? It just seems more obvious.

Macaroni
The other good thing about shopping in farm shops is the people you meet. I bumped into Suzie from the Overbury Estate back in October at Home Farm, and she told me about their new flour. Back in '05/ '06 the estate were milling some of their wheat in an old hand mill in the manor kitchen. What amazing flour that made - a texture and taste that is impossible to get with massed produced flour. Only problem was it had a short shelf life. If they froze it it would last, but not many people wanted to buy it like that.

Fast forward a few years and Prince Charles opened the new Stanway mill just a few miles away at the end of October last year. The wheat from overbury estate only has to travel about 10 miles to the mill. The flour above comes from that first bag - a sample I was given to try out by Mrs. Bossom of the Overbury Estate just before Christmas when I was cooking for one of their shoot lunches. They were interested to see what I thought, though I was warned that that was the first milling, and the stones are going to take a long time to grind down and be workable. They are working on June at the moment for it to be available. In fact what I had was rather rough, raw product. There was some talk too of the miller working on the gluten content - flour is a technical business these days. Indeed there was quite a bit of bran left which I sieved out (right) and saved to and to my next granola. And the remainder of the flour I am going to use for bread.

The texture of the flour was just a joy. Light and fluffy, but slightly coarser (almost granular) than shop brought flour. There's no doubt which is better. You also get the malty wholemeal flavour too.

200g flour, sifted
2 eggs

And that's it - no water. I went for the authentic version. No salt either - there is enough flavour in the sauce and lobster. You mix it like bread dough. The flour, as it turned out, was rather thirsty, so I added more egg - about another 3/4. and kneaded for a minute or two till smooth and wrapped it in clingfilm and left it to one side.


The difference after 20 minutes was amazing - a complete change from a hard dough to something elastic and pliable. So I ran it through the pasta machine a few times (c. 10 times altogether), folding it over and reducing the gauge. Have to say it was some of the best pasta I had made which I put down to the new flour.

At this point, I should say I got the next tip from here. You cut the pasta sheets into 1.5 x 3cm strips (or there abouts). Then brush the end with water and roll the up with onto a chopstick. Yes - it really is that easy!

After blanching in just off boiling salted water for 3 mins I drained it, transferred it to a clean tea towel to soak up excess water and added the macaroni to the the lobster shell (see below).

Lobster
Well I was hoping to get a live lobster like this critter. But the snow meant I really didn't want to go up to Cirencester and New Wave specially. All the guests I was cooking for that week were going for meat main courses rather than fish, so I couldn't make a good fish order to be delivered (which I could add the lobster to) so in the end I found a cooked one on the fish counter at the Cheltenham Waitrose (you can always rely on them).

Thermidor sauce
I was just going to make normal cheese sauce when I thought of thermidor - how can you improve on a classic?
One of the parties the week before had been cancelled due to the holiday house being inaccessible (down a long very remote country lane full of snow). So I had this piece of St. Kenelm cheese from Gorsehill Abbey Farm to use. When I was researching local produce when I first started up coming up to 4 years ago I was suprised to find this farm was only a couple of miles away at the other end of the village so I walked over to pick up a few samples and then walked back via Barnfield - well you have to really. It really is amazing what you have on your own doortep without realising.

The St. Kenelm, a hard cheese similar to cheddar, was in this case quite a young version - not too overposwering.

Why you rarely see recipes here is I never measure anything unless its of the dessert/ pastry persuasion - so Ihope these amounts work.

25ml butter
1/8 large onion fine chopped
Glass of white wine (175 ml)
200ml chicken stock
100ml double cream
Small handful grated st. Kenelm
1/2 tsp english mustard

Sweat the onion (could use shallot instead) in the butter till soft. Add wine, stock and cream and bring to the boil. Reduce heat slightly so it doesn't burn and reduce by half. Stir in the mustard and cheese and remove from heat. Season to taste.

Then spoon some sauce on top the pasta. Slice the lobster tail on an angle and place it on top of the pasta. The claw meat goes in the head. Brush a little more sauce over the top of the lobster and glaze with a blow torch (you could use a grill of course). This makes 2 halves - it is quite rich so you probably only need one half each.




Maybe this would be a good dish for Valentine's Day?
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Cooking lobsters for lobster mac n cheese June 2010
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Lobster Macaroni and Cheese

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