Characteristics

Appears in
Professional Cooking: 8th Edition
Professional Cooking

By Wayne Gisslen

Published 2014

  • About
  1. The northern lobster is perhaps the most prized of all shellfish. It has a large, flexible tail, four pairs of legs, and two large claws. Its shell is dark green or bluish green but turns red when cooked.
  2. Meat from the tail, claws, and legs is eaten. It is white and sweet, with a distinctive taste. Claw meat is considered especially good. The coral (roe or eggs), which is dark green when raw and red when cooked, and the light green tomalley (liver) in the thorax or body portion are also eaten.

  3. Lobsters are classified by weight.

    Chicken 1 lb (450 g)
    Quarters 1¼ lb (575 g)
    Halves or Selects 1½ to 2¼ lb (675 to 1025 g)
    Jumbos over 2½ lb (1130 g)

  4. Lobsters weighing over 20 lb (9 kg) have been caught, but they are rare.
  5. Yield: A 1-lb lobster yields about ¼ lb cooked meat, or a 500-g lobster yields about 125 g cooked meat.
  6. Sometimes customers request female lobsters in order to get the coral, so you should be able to tell females from males. Look at the pairs of tiny legs (called swimmerets) under the tail. If the pair closest to the front is soft and flexible, the lobster is female. If it is hard, the lobster is male.