Lobsters, Take 2

This is how it started...

...and this is how it ended...
I was going to make the bisque again. It's an amazing recipe, but it just seemed so unfair that you cook a bunch of lobsters, which takes a grand total of 10 minutes, but you don't get to eat for another 2 hours. Yes, it's worth it for this bisque, but just not this time. This time I wanted lobster fastfood. So my mom, my aunt and I walked up to the grocery store, bought our lobsters and I offered to carry them back down the hill to the house. I didn't even hold them at arms length from my body out of fear. I courageously threw them into my shoulder bag and let them bounce a tiny, tiny bit against my hip all the way home. I was gentle, but I was showing those lobsters who was boss.

My home in Newfoundland actually has a lobster pot so we could boil three small lobsters in one go. The suffering would be quick. Our suffering, I mean. The lobsters' suffering would take the same amount of time no matter when they got added to the pot. Still, they had to be added one at a time...

When we got home with the 3 poor fellows, I put the bag straight into the fridge while I boiled a big pot of salted water. I had about 4 cups of water, a cup and a half of sake (leftover, so I threw it in), 1/4 cup of salt (just throw in a lot) and a few slices of ginger (because all of Asia agrees that ginger goes well with sake in sauces). When I got the lobsters out of the fridge once the water had come to a boil, they weren't moving. This had happened last time too...so I was pretty sure they weren't dead...just lethargic. Elastic bands firmly in place, I picked up the first lobster by his bottom and put him into the pot (pictured above).

Lobster number 2

Then in went lobster number 2, and finally lobster number 3.

Lobster number 3

Lobster number 3 looks a little more excited to finally be warm. No one cried (me, or the lobsters, or my mother, or my aunt) and when the water came back to a boil, I set the timer for 10 minutes and cooked the three crustaceans in the covered pot.

In the meantime...

I got three little bowls of butter melted ready. That's all you need for this. I also had some chile-garlic paste leftover (to continue the Asian theme from the sake and ginger) and so I put that out too. Really, the lobster meat didn't need much of anything, and the meal of sweet potatoes, lobster and salad was absolutely incredible. The great thing is it takes a bunch of time to shuck the lobster, so you work for your dinner, instead of gobbling it up quickly and still feeling hungry and wishing you'd killed an extra lobster or two. Besides, all that butter needs time to soak into your body. It is my favourite kind of body butter. Take that, Body Shop.

Roasted Sweet Potatoes

This is the best side dish in the world, possibly besides roasted sweet potato fries. All you need is:

As many sweet potatoes as you want
Aluminum foil to wrap the sweet potatoes
A fork
Salt
Pepper (optional)
Other spices (optional)
a teaspoon of oil (optional)
An oven (definitely not optional, unless you have a BBQ)

In most recipe books that means that all you need is sweet potatoes because it's assumed that you'll have the rest. Geez, you don't even need a baking sheet. I used a knife because I wanted to shorten the cooking time, but you don't even need that. You certainly don't need a knife to eat the result. They will be soft and taste like candy.

Instructions:
1. Wash the sweet potatoes. Don't you dare peel them. The skin is the best part.

2. Prick the sweet potatoes with a fork (they'll explode in the oven if you don't prick them...)

3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

4. Sprinkle the sweet potatoes with the salt and pepper (and oil if you want, but you don't need it). I actually sprinkled them with sake even though you don't actually need any liquid, because that's what I had leftover from the Asian-Inspired Dinner Party...you'll see an antena of that part in the corner of the picture above...recipe post to come...

You can also add other spices, like the ones you would use to make sweet potato fries, like paprika, cayenne, oregano, basil, garlic powder. Almost anything, but keep it simple the first time and experiment after you've had your first success. The potatoes are great plain, or served with butter. The melted butter made a whole lot of sense with the antenna part of the meal (see bottom right corner of photo above)...I also had a bit of chili-garlic paste left over that I used as a kind of dip...mmm...garlic.

5. Wrap the sweet potatoes in aluminum foil (shiny side facing in. The shiny metal in theory keeps the heat in and roasts the sweet potatoes more evenly, instead of reflecting the heat out of the foil), tightly, and place directly into the oven. Roast until tender, about an hour and 15 minutes. You can also roast at a higher temperature, say 425 degrees, and cut the roasting time to about 45 minutes, but I like the long and slow version and I actually had enough time for once. If you want them to cook a fair bit faster, or you just don't want whole roasted sweet potatoes, cut them into similarly-sized pieces before wrapping them in foil. You can wrap them individually or in packets.

6. The sweet potatoes are done when you open the foil and you can easily insert a fork into the flesh. They shouldn't be too mushy and falling apart, but they should be softened. Just like baked regular potato. In fact, you can make this recipe with any kind of potato, but the sweetness is amazing...Also sweet potatoes have a higher water content, I'm pretty sure, so they cook faster.

Enjoy summer and sweet potatoes and barbecuing!!!