Lobster Tagliatelle

Today I tried cooking something totally new to me.

I might have eaten lobster two or three times for special occasions, the last one I remember was Silvester 2016 a lobster soup, but I never tried preparing a lobster dish myself, because I feel not able to throw a living animal into cooking water and I also always felt lobster is an ingredient, which is way to exspensive for me.

So I was quite surprised, when I found cooked whole lobsters frozen at Lidl for about six pound. Since I found that, I was always thinking of making a lobster dish. However, I didn't know how to.

So I started googling and found that video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijlY1mSFzU8 which shows how easy it is to prepare Lidl's lobster.
To be honest, no, unfortunatley it is not thaaaaat easy. My first try to open one of the shells ended up with me being splashed all over my shirt with lobster juice, uuuugh... So this guidance is more realistic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CXj9SkYH6s :-)

However, once you have managed to seperate shells and meat, this gives a really tasty dish. Lobster has got a lot of aroma, which makes a fantastic sauce!

Lobster Tagliatelle

Ingredients for two:

1 whole Lobster

1 medium Onion

3 gloves Garlic

2 medium Carrots

1 Parsnip

1 Leek

2-3 tbsp. Butter

2 tbsp. Tomato Paste

125ml dry White Wine

300ml Vegetable Stock

200g Sugar Snaps

400g Pasta of Choice

Freshly cracked pepper

Some fresh herbs if you like

Some salt

Method:

Firstly, if using a fresh lobster, you need to cook it. Please google for instructions.

If you are using a pre-cooked, frozen lobster, please defrost it gently in the fridge, this is not only better for the food quality, but also saves you energy ;-)

Once the lobster is ready, remove the legs and claws by pulling away from the socket and separate the head from the tail by holding firmly and twisting until the pieces break apart.

Then remove the meat from the tail by laying it on it’s side and using the palm of your hand, press firmly down to crack the shell and chop the meat into bite sized pieces. Then set aside.

To remove the meat from the claws, firmly tap on it with a rolling pin or any other heavy good. I actually tried it with a can of coconut milk, however the can looked worse then the lobster claws after it *haha*.

Peel away any loosened shell and pull out the meat. Once all meat has been removed, chop into bite sized pieces as well and put all the lobster meat back into the fridge, we don't want to get poisend!

Now take the lobster shells and legs to wash and remove any leftover meat.

Peal and roughly chop the onion and garlic. Then roughly slice the parsnip, carrot and the lower white half of the leek.

Heat a medium to large coated pot over high heat and melt 1-2 tbsp. butter in it. Add the lobster shells and legs, as well as all prepared veggies and roast for a few minutes. Wipe off with the white wine. Then add the stock and tomato puree and turn the heat down to medium, to let it simmer for 20 minutes.

Afterwards strain the stock, add back to the pot and whisk the mascarpone into the stock. Let it simmer for a few more minutes. In the meantime heat up some water for the pasta and cook it until al dente.

In the meanwhile, slice the remaining leek finely. Take out the lobster meat and slice into palatable pieces.

In a medium frying pan, heat up the remainig butter over medium heat.

Roast the leek and sugar snaps for a few minutes, until they get slightly brown on the edges.

Then add the lobster meat and turn of the heat.

Season with some salt, if required.

Now finally season the lobster sauce with some freshyl cracked pepper and arrange pasta, lobster veggies and the sauce on two large plates.

Garnish with some basil and Enjoy :-)