When in Maine ...

Put down your Pop Tart. Or banana or whatever your breakfast food of choice happens to be. I mean, the name of the blog is "Good morning from Maine," so there has to be a morning post for you to read. You have to trust me on the food thing.

Living in Maine presents unique food opportunities. Or names, at least. It really is a slice of gastronomical heaven. Locally made ice cream shops abound. If you have ice cream, you'll want jimmies on them (sprinkles). But what to eat before that? Simple. Lobster.

Roar! Let's shoot hoops.

That's what everybody wants when they come to visit Maine. I tolerate lobsters. You wouldn't know it by my lobster-on-it license plate, but I don't particularly like lobster or seafood of any kind. Go ahead. Throw things at me, virtually. (Note to Steve Jobs: There ought to be a way to do that on iPad3). We make our lobsters seem cute here.  We picture them smiling. We have stuffed animals of them. Our local basketball team is called the Maine Red Claws (with the I-kid-you-not fanbase of "Crustacean Nation.") and they have a forbidding mascot. By God, we love lobsters.

The truth is messier than that. I know this from relatively recent experience. Have you ever cooked lobster? This is why I told you to put down the food. I'm something of a chef. We'll get to that some other time. I have the best cookie recipe you will ever make yourself. Yes, this is a bold promise, but it's one that I can back up. In season, lobster can drop as low as $2.99 a pound, though $3.99 seems about the typical bottom end. "You know," I thought to myself one day, "it would be really useful if I knew how to cook lobster so when there are visitors, I can cook cheap lobster!"

Great idea. Sort of. The lobster came from the downtown fish shop. It smelled horrible. Just God awful. And it was filled with tourists fresh off the boat. No, really, that's a thing here. We're a big port. Who knew?

I brought the LIVE lobster home in a medium-size brown paper bag. I googled "how to cook lobster." I found the state of Maine's cooking instructions (take that, Nebraska!). Here is the complicated recipe: Boil a pot of water. Add some salt. Add a lobster. Simmer for 12 minutes. Remove the lobster. Eat.

All went according to plan. The water boiled. Salt was added. I dumped the lobster, rubber bands still attached to the claws, straight into the water. Don't like my style? You remove the rubber bands before cooking and let me know how that goes for you. As soon as it hit the water, the lobster immediately snapped into a ball. And then it just kept moving. For the first two minutes in the pot, the lobster kept moving. And moving. My God, just stop moving. There are tails of lobsters who "scream" when they're in the water. This was not observed. I have to give less detail now because I'm getting a little queasy. There's a reason there's no photos with this.

I removed Boily, my pet lobster. OK. It's bright red now. I guess it's ready. I'll just get my lobster cracker ready and ... oh. Right. I don't have any way of actually eating this lobster. Well, I'll just get the giant kitchen knife and hack through this sucker. I started on the claws, but it was like sawing through a plaster wall with a plastic knife. I switched to the tail. I was met with the largest amount of green goo I have ever seen in the back of a lobster. It's called the tomalley. It's kind of a delicacy. It really shouldn't be. Cliff's Notes version: It's essentially cooked lobster poop.

I tried to hack the claws again. Really, I did. And then, eventually, thoroughly disgusted at my attempt to eat a lobster, I fed it to my dog. That is how my dog ate lobster. I know. I should have just given the cookie recipe and let you go on about your morning. Enjoy that Pop Tart.