October 27, 2011--Midcoast: Lobster Fra Diavolo Concluded

“We’ll only here a couple more weeks,” Rona said to the lobsterman, “But if you’re still open maybe we’ll come back for some more. We, I mean he, want to make one last seafood stew. You don’t have any clams and mussels I suppose?”

He shook his head. "Just bugs. I mean lobsters. But we'll still be here. We're open all year." And then acknowledging me, still half behind Rona, as we turned to leave, he said with a wink, “I hope that fra diavolo of yours turns out OK. Maybe as good as my wife’s.”

“I’ll settle for OK,” I said, also with a wink, which, because of my obscured vantage point, he couldn’t possibly see.

I headed quickly to the car, Rona trailing with the bag of lobsters held carefully away from her body as if they were an offering. One cannot be too careful when it comes to transporting extra-lively lobsters, I thought. I was eager now to get them home and deal with whatever was in store for us.

When there I offered, “Can I do anything to help with the steaming?” I was still not convinced that Rona was up to the challenge.

But she shot me a look as if to say, “Back off. You’re in my space. Don’t crowd me. It’s hunting and gathering time in Midcoast Maine.”

And so I backed off but not before retrieving the largest pot we have from the cabinet and filling it with about two inches of water. Rona in the meantime was at the computer and, I assumed, googling “steaming lobsters.” Peering at the screen I could hear her saying to herself, “It looks as if you steam them based on their weight. For pound-and-a-halfers I think 14 to 15 minutes should work. Maybe 14 since they’ll get cooked more when we add them to the far diavolo sauce.” I stood in the living room nodding, attempting to send subliminal instructions.

She got up to turn on the stove top and then, checking the water I had put in the pot, glanced in my direction as she took it from the stove to the sink and proceeded to pour out half the water, muttering, “I’m not boiling them; I’m steaming them. No need to drown them.” I looked down at my feet.

I overheard her talking to herself, “It says to plunge them into boiling water head first. She next retrieved the bag of lobsters from the refrigerator. “It’s the most humane way to do it, they say,” and dropped the bag into the sink. From the lobsters struggling within it, the bag, as if alive itself, expanded and contracted and slid back and forth in the sink.

“I need to get the rubber bands off their claws. It says that if you don’t, in the steaming, some of the taste from the rubber can permeate the meat and . . ..”

I couldn’t contain myself, “Sorry to be interfering,” It was clear from Rona’s reaction that I was, “but if you do that won’t you be putting yourself at risk when you try to get them in the pot. The pot we have isn’t that big and . . .”

“And, nothing! I’m not putting myself at risk. Please. I’m just steaming a couple of lobsters and I won’t be trying to put them in the pot, I will be putting them in the pot. So, as I said, back off. I need to do this on my own.”

I got the point and retreated into the living room, but not that far that I couldn’t observe or overhear since she continued to talk to herself. Actually, now more to the lobsters than herself.

“I’m only taking off the rubber bands. Hold still for a moment.” She had emptied them into the sink. I could hear the sounds of their crusher and pincher claws and carapaces as they scratched around in the aluminum basin.

“There, isn’t that better? I know what I have to do and you know that too.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “You knew this was the deal. It’s cruel I admit. But it’s a part of nature. We’re all a part of nature and in one way or other all of our times will one day come.”

The water by then was boiling and I could see the steam rising from the pot. I was nervous and could only imagine what Rona was feeling. On the other hand, I checked myself—“What’s the matter with me? What’s the big deal? As Rona was saying earlier—isn’t it time to stop pretending that our food comes to us bloodlessly with the killing part kept at enough of a distance so that we can deny the reality of what’s involved?”

I looked across to the kitchen and saw that Rona had retrieved one of the lobsters from the sink. Holding it in the air for the last time it squirmed in her hand, violently snapping its claws in impotent frustration. Rona appeared to be rock solid in her resolve. With her other hand she reached to remove the lid.

“Do you want any help with that?” I called over to her. She didn’t even bother to look my way. “I can . . .”

Before I could utter another word, I watched as she plunged the first lobster head first into the steam bath. “I read,” she again said to him, “that it,” I knew what the it was, “that it won’t hurt. Maybe,” she corrected herself, acknowledging the truth, “not for more than a second or two.”

And then she averted her eyes as she submerged it and quickly closed the lid. I watched as she stood by the stove, I assumed waiting to see if it in fact was quick and painless. Satisfied, she reached back to the sink for the second one; but just as she was about to do with it what she had done to its brother, she hesitated and leaned closer to the bubbling pot.

“What am I hearing?” I heard her ask, “It’s now at least 15 seconds since I put you in there so why I am hearing sounds from the pot?”

“Maybe,” I ventured to say, “the agitation of the water and steam is moving him around so that it’s bumping into the inside of the pot. I’m sure it’s . . .”

Without turning toward me, Rona said, again more to the lobster than to me, “The sounds I’m hearing are from you, not the boiling water or steam. You’re either still alive or, since that can’t be, as I read, there can be spasms. After you pass. I mean, are killed.”

Using the k-word, having crossed that line, she turned her attention back to the second homarus, which followed its cousin, this time quite professionally, into the bubbling cauldron.

Rona set the timer to 14 minutes and began to pace about the kitchen, always with her eyes on the pot, humming something inaudible.

I started to think again about the diavolo sauce. We had stopped to pick up a pound of the last of the locally-grown tomatoes and I had some fresh clam juice to add the to mix. And of course just the right mix of peppers to make sure the fra was very diavolo. If those lobsters of Rona’s are steamed just right, I thought, we had the makings of a splendid meal.

Lost in my recipe reverie, it seemed as if the 14 minutes evaporated. I heard Rona say, “OK guys, it’s time to get you out of there.” She had our big tongs in hand and extracted them from the steam bath one by one, both glowing a dark red. Just as they look at the nearby restaurants that make them their specialty.

“You can come back,” Rona called out to me. “I’ll let them cool for a few minutes then get the meat out of the shells. If I do say so myself, they look just right.” She was smiling ear-to-ear I suspected as much for what she felt she had accomplished—and for a Brooklyn girl indeed had—as for how well they seemed to have turned out.

We had a splendid dinner. The lobsters were perfectly steamed and picked and my sauce I felt certain compared favorably with the lobsterman’s wife’s.

Over our second glass of pinot noir, Rona looked across at me—obviously feeling very good about herself—and said, “I’m ready to go back to New York now. And when we return in the spring let’s be sure to steam all our own lobsters.”

“For sure, “I said.” Then added, “Maybe while we’re in the city we’ll go down to Chinatown for some shrimp with lobster sauce. It’s still one of my favorites.”

Rona continued to smile as she sopped up the last of the diavolo sauce with the final bits of lobster meat.