Mainly Food, Part 4: Some fish have shells

I had no intention of going to Maine and not sampling local foods, whatever that turned out to be. You won't be surprised that it included lobster.

Maine's summer is short, so there is no Portland Tomato or Eastport Pepper. There are Maine potatoes, blueberries, and maple syrup. And you can fish most of the year for something, so chowders are staples.  They're everywhere, like in a diner in the small town of Bowdoinham:


What kind of fish was in the chowdah was a mystery, but you can bet it had potatoes and milk as a base.

In fact making chowder at home is pretty easy when you have access to the following stuff--"fish parts 29¢/lb", "lobster bodies $1.50/bag"--sold in many seafood markets. I made a nice lobster stock for later:






 
The big deal here is the so-called lobster roll. It's basically lobster meat usually with mayo (alternately butter) on a soft hotdoggish roll. Lobster roll aficianodos argue whether a leaf of lettuce should go on the roll, but the anti-lettuce people tend to prevail. It's mostly a summer treat, an in-hand sandwich for warm-weather coastal slumming. If the lobster is fresh, it's wonderful.  In my limited experience so far, most places use all claw meat, like the  one below (which cost $12.95). 

When I asked about it, their argument to me was that the claw meat is sweeter, and the red color is more visually appealing.  Personally, I think it's because the claw meat is cheaper, so the profit margin is higher--tails get shipped to out-of-state markets, claws get put on lobster rolls. Ka-ching.

(Important Note: Lobster tails are technically not tails, but thoraxes, but they would never be called that because it's a dreadful word with no sex appeal, and it sounds like an animal from a Dr. Seuss story. Compare: "I'm eating some tail tonight" vs "I'm eating some thorax tonight."  Hmm?)

I visited Eastport for a few days, and I wanted to try something other than lobster while I was there, but lobster was about all that was safe to eat. This sign on a telephone pole near the water tells the tale:

 

Such paralytic poisons, caused by what are known as "red tides", are not killed by cooking, have no taste, and can paralyze your breathing in 2 hours. You'd basically become the steamed clam you ate. I happily munched on lobster tails, pondered the possible taste of a carnivorous whelk, and wondered whether the snails were also meat eaters. This made me rethink the slugs in my garden back home. I would have to wait for another trip for a comparison of clam chowdah DownEast. Or whatever else was available. Next, more fish tails/tales.