July 12, 2019 • 55 mins
These crustaceans haven’t always been a luxury food, but they have always reminded people of bugs. Anney and Lauren explore the lobster’s economic (and entomologic) history plus some of the weirdest points of their amazing biology.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello, and welcome to Savor Protection. If I heart radio
and stuff media, I'm Annies and I'm Lauren Vocal Bomb.
And today we're talking about lobsters. Yes, it is a
very very exciting day here. It is. Uh. First of all,
super producer Andrew is from Maine. Um. He has a
pervasive fondness for for lobsters and distinct opinions about the
(00:30):
lobster role he does. I am a little concerned we
will get in trouble with super Producer Andrew Um. And
I just wanted to say that while we were in Hawaii,
he purchased probably the coolest lobster magnet that exists. Yeah. Yeah,
it's all weekly. It's high quality. Uh. I mean that's
(00:50):
the color of a of a lobster like in the water.
Basically it's true. But that night, it was a magical night,
and that lobster was there for most of it. Was
there last night in Hawaii. Yes, yes, Um. I had
a friend in high school who actually she I knew
her from. I knew her from when she was four.
(01:11):
But I remember in high school thinking how bizarre to
me it was that on Thanksgiving they would get lobster
in that way instead of Turkey have lobster. Okay, Thanksgiving dinner? Cool?
They were from the North, Okay, I've I haven't heard
of people doing that. But it makes perfect sense, I suppose.
(01:31):
You know. What doesn't make perfect sense is why the
world hasn't see that picture of you as a lobster, Lauren,
because I've been slacking. Oh no, no, we must see. Yeah.
I wish I had video of it because because like
this lobster magnet, like the little legs were Okay. So
this one time I was, I was I was working
(01:53):
for gel haven't heard the story. I was working with
a with a medical journal of course as a copy editor.
We had an annual convention that we helped that the
company ran, where like fourteen thousand drheumatologists would descend upon
a city and and every year we would you know,
market for the next year's convention. And one year, my
(02:14):
first year with the company, we were in d C.
The next year the convention was going to be in Boston.
Lobsters are in Boston, and so the marketing material had
lobsters on it, and one of the higher ups got
this idea that we should give away a ticket to
next year's convention by dressing up some Porschemo in a
full body lobster suit and have them yeah go hand
(02:37):
out a free ticket to next year. And one one
day I was that schmo and how was it? Uh,
you know, it was heck and great um, to be honest,
like this suit was it was. It was really lightweight.
It was a little bit warm, um. But but the
cool part was that the you know, your your your
arms are in the claws and the elbows, like like
(02:58):
right where your elbow is, right at the joint of
the of the cloth. Yeah, it had a string like
a fishing line that ran down to all of the
little legs coming off of the belly of the suit.
So so when so if you put your arms a
kimbo and you wiggle them, all the little legs would
wiggle because they're attached to the strings. Some craftsmanship. It
was great. I was. I was. I mean also, like
(03:22):
you know, like I was just tickled by the experience.
I didn't have to do it more than once, which helped.
But right right, I bet you brought a lot of joy,
perhaps fear, I hope less fear and more joy. I
definitely like got a really great picture of it that
I put on my Christmas card for that year. The
inscription on the inside of the Christmas card was and
(03:44):
you thought that my degree in English wouldn't get me anywhere?
See that's wonderful, But I was technically working in my field.
There you go. You see, sometimes your job calls you
calls me dress up and alps, you're outfit. We all
know it. It could happen to either one of us
any day. Now. Oh gosh, I'm honestly surprised it hasn't.
(04:07):
I am too. I feel like beIN Boland probably has
done it. Oh I don't know. I know he's done
a hot dog. Well, it's bound to happen if it
hasn't already. Yeah. And didn't you get like a lobster
stuffed animal? Oh gosh, yeah, I sorry. So after this Christmas,
this whole incident, like it sort of became a meme
(04:29):
of Lauren and some of my friends did in fact
get me a like toddler or bigger sized stuffed lobster toy?
Oh my goodness. That it was holding a big heart,
I think, and it had these creepy eyes with all
this eyeshadow on them or I don't know, and and
(04:51):
these big red lips and and the heart said, um,
love Lobster of yours, And eventually I was just like,
I don't need this in my home anymore, but it's
going to show up again one day. Oh gosh, I'm
the curstall. I really I would. I'll take Annabelle look
(05:12):
like I This thing was not my favorite. My roommate
at the time was incredulous, like like, you can't get
rid of the love Lobster. And I was like, you
watch me, you take it right, it can go in
your room. He was like no. I was like, well, no,
(05:34):
the Sisterhood of the Traveling Mobster, that's what it could be.
I hope it's somebody has it and it's made their day.
I mean I donated it, so who knows if anyone
listening happens to have it. Oh my gosh, right, and
I believe it was available for purchase at like Walgreens
or something like that around Valentine's Day, So maybe someone
(05:56):
else has seen it. If you're like significant other gave
you a love lobster, I can't imagine getting that. I
might really like it. It's hard to say. It was
pretty creepy. I don't think I have a picture of it,
but I'll see what I can do. Okay, we need
the picture of you in it and the love Lobster,
Love Lobster. It sounds like a show. It is seen
(06:17):
as very romantic, which I always thought was weird because
there's are any other food I can't imagine, but a
few that look as gross. Was trying to crack open
like a lobster in the amount of work, and like, yeah,
I always end up cutting myself blood involved. It's like
a weird ritual. Now. I mean, I'm not going to
(06:37):
tell you how to do your love life, but I
like I like a slightly gentler meal personally, No love
lobster for us. WHOA, My my experience with lobster is
not nearly as exciting. You can hear some of it
in our Red Lobster episode. It was like that was
(06:58):
the fancy restaurant in my life. But I do have
a lot of cultural notes immediately that I thought of, Um,
Number one, Larry the Lobster from SpongeBob. Oh okay, yeah, Wikipedia,
The first thing that comes up. I type in Larry
the Lobster from Wikipedia. Residents four or five seven, life drive, interest, weightlifting, surfing, girls, occupation,
(07:21):
weightlifter lifeguard. It's like he's a real person Wikipedia. And
then there's the infamous sign felled lobster episode. That's the
one with the shrinkage if you know what I mean lobsters,
The Friends episode about you know, She's your lobster, the
movie by the same name, The Lobster. Yeah, I will
(07:42):
say Phoebe was incorrect. Lobster relationships really only last like
ten to fourteen days my whole that's the foundation of
of the lobster episode of Friends. I know in my relationship.
This is why I haven't made it very far. Taking
relationship advice from friends is not a good idea. What
I will think about that later. But right now, let's
(08:04):
get to our question because the answer is fascinating. Oh yes, lobsters.
What are they? Well, a few different animals that humans
eat are referred to as lobsters, but they're all crustaceans,
that is, types of arthropods, which are creatures that wear
(08:24):
their skeletons around on the outside of their bodies instead
of on the inside. There is the American lobster, and
the one which we will be mostly concerned with today,
that's a Homarus americanus, a cold water creature ten legs total,
with claws on the first four, including a large asymmetrical
pair right up front. Um. They're generally a modeled greenish
(08:46):
or brownish color, though they can come in combinations of
that plus or minus, like yellow and orange and blue
or even red. Though their shells turn red during cooking
because the heat breaks down. These bonds lock up this
one pigment with proteins in their shells that make it
look green brown. Thus, released by the heat, the pigment
looks red. The pigment in question is acts as xanthin,
(09:09):
which is a carrotenoid see our carrot episode. Um. Yeah,
it's found in plants which are eaten by the lobsters. Prey, carrot, yep,
yep yep. Then there is the European lobster that's Hamrus gammarus.
It's very similar to the American lobster except for a
for coloration. They're dark blue with kind of cream spotting
and like a like a yellow or pinkish belly. H
(09:32):
Then there's a spiny lobster comes from a whole different
biological family. These are warm water creatures spiny uh no
pronounced claws not a rock, but a rock lobster. Oh
my goodness, I think the podcast is over. That that
(09:53):
was one step too far. I never know it was
gonna be the B fifty two all this time. Yes,
um uh yeah, this is going to be a whole
different episode. Really, but I did want to put in
here that spiny lobsters migrate as cold water lobsters tend
to as well. Um, but they navigate the spiny lobster
(10:14):
via magnetic reception um, meaning that they can sense the
Earth's magnetic fields, meaning that their bodies contain some magnetic
material for that sensory input, although probably not enough for
lobster to stick to magnet And I don't know how
many of y'all are old enough to remember that whole video,
(10:35):
but oh, lobster sticks to magnet is a thing you
don't No, I did not know. Oh gosh, you can.
You can look it up. I immediately was thinking, so
magneto can't, Like, why have we not seen magneto lobsters. Yeah,
that seems like a really big missed opportunity. I think
that we should call somebody. Ian McKellen. I'm on a number.
(11:01):
He'll yeah, he'll be like this. Oh, I would love
to see that goodness. Um. But but yeah, other lobsters
are being investigated for for this potential property since they
do also migrate. But you know, science is looking into
it as they should. We mostly eat the large, unfatty,
(11:25):
white colored muscles that are found in lobsters tails and claws. Um.
It's a mild and slightly sweet flavored meat with a
little bit of like briny sea flavor to it, and
it can taste a little bit musky or fishy as well. Um. Yeah,
lobsters they look like a face hugger, tastes like the ocean.
They do look like a face hugger. You're right, they're
The more pictures that I looked of at them during
(11:46):
this research, the more I was like, oh god, they're
scary they are looking but pretty cool. Yes, Oh gosh,
it could have rest this forever. Okay, Uh, lobster size,
so this is a cool thing. Um Okay. By law
(12:07):
in the United States, lobster is gonna be harvested once
they're over one pound by weight that's a little bit
under half a kilo. And there's some cost benefit analysis
in there. You want to let them live long enough
to propagate, um and to be worth the effort of
catching um. Like, even a one pound lobster only contains
about one fifth of a pound of meat, so yeah,
smaller than that. It's like, why are you bothering? And Okay.
(12:29):
The cool part about this is the way that lobsters
grow is uh, you know, as they grow their their
squishy bodies get too big for their hard shells, and
so they molt and grow a new shell. They usually
eat the old shell for fuel, like immediate laid because
it is hungry work building a shell, and those shells
are rich in calcium. So gross, I love it. I
(12:53):
love it. Uh. And it takes a lobster twenty to
thirty malts over the course of its first five to
seven years to reach that one pound size. After that,
they slow their molting process a little bit. That's like
they're kind of like entrance into adulthood when they may
be only malt like once a year. They slow their molds. Yeah,
slow their malt. Oh my goodness. But um, but lobsters
(13:15):
can get big. Yes I can. I'm sorry the image
in my head. I gotta shake that, okay. Yes. The
largest lobster on record was caught in off the coast
of Nova Scotia. It weighed forty four pounds, which is
about twenty kilos, and was forty two inches long about
one hundred and seven cimeters. That is like just over
(13:36):
three ft or one meter. Like that's the size of
a long toddler. Like that's enormous. I would think I
had discovered some kind of alien creatures for sure. And
scientists think it was one hundred years old, which is
double the lifespan of your usual lobster m shellfish of
a certainty that they say, um, younger American lobsters tend
(14:00):
to stay mostly in like warmish inshore waters, but older
ones will venture out into the deep sea and yes
do my great seasonally. The record for migration is two
miles in a single year for this one specimen that
was tagged off of the continental shelf in the Atlantic
and found again in Long Island, New York. WHOA, Yeah,
(14:21):
good for you, buddy. Yeah getting around And yes, okay,
I've got some lobster facts for you. Yeah, yeah, they're weird,
They're weird. This was weird. Lobster facts was the subject
of my very first list show video, What the Stuff,
which I accidentally named after uh A lumpy Space Princess
(14:44):
line from uh Adventure Purpose super accidentally, Like, I was
just like spitting out all of these stuff related titles
and I was just like, what the stuff? That's funny?
And yeah, then I don't know, like a couple of
weeks later, I was a you watching an episode and
she was like, what the stuff fin and I was like, oh, man, well,
(15:05):
anyway I remember that video. Um so yes. Lobster facts. Okay,
first of all, let's talk about how lobsters eat and digest.
The cold water American lobster is mostly nocturnal and is
a carnivore. It hunts fish and shell fish and will
definitely kill and eat other lobsters, though that happens more
often with lobsters kept captive in close quarters then out
(15:29):
in the world. And they will eat plants too, but
they prefer meat. Yeah, lobsters have two stomachs. The first
stomach is located in in the thorax what would consider
the lobster's head, like right behind its eyes, and it
contains these teeth like things called a gastric mill that
crushed the lobster's prey. And yes, it looks vaguely like
a scar lock if that's if you're trying to picture it. Um.
(15:53):
Once the food is ground, fine, it passes through to
the second stomach, which is this large digestive gland. That
that that filters smaller bits, which are more likely to
be nutritive, out from the larger bits which are to
be excreted like eventually, Um, the smaller bits going to
be processed by a gland called tomali or to molly. Uh,
not to Molly, that's different anyway. Um, it's got a
(16:16):
y at the end, which is sort of like our liver.
And uh, this this thing will turn green when you
cook a lobster, and it's sometimes considered an especial delicacy. Okay, yeah, Uh,
Lobsters probably don't see very well, but they make up
for it in terms of taste, smell, and touch. They
mostly get around through smell. In touch, lobsters p out
(16:39):
of their faces for emotional purposes. Yes, I I recently
had a couple of beers and was telling a stranger
all about this. Okay, it's intriguing. I can't say something
(17:00):
like that one to know more and not want to
know more, that's ridiculous. Okay, So, so lobsters excrete waste
from a few spots on their body, but they urinate
out of openings on their face called nephrophors. And this
isn't just about getting rid of bodily waste and other toxins.
(17:20):
UM lobsters urinate in each other's faces during fights, and
male lobsters are super fighty yeah um to to express themselves,
to express their full range of emotion about the experience UM,
and lady lobster's urine contains pheromones to get dude lobsters
like relaxed and in the mood. UM part. Part of
(17:42):
the lobster mating process involves the female lobster repeatedly peeing
into the shelter belonging to the male lobster that she's
hoping to mate with. That's a pretty clear signal that,
I mean, it's hard to miss that. You're like, welp,
something's up. I should go check this out. Speaking of
(18:04):
the reproduction process, UM, female lobsters practice reproductive planning. A
female lobster chooses her mate, she makes the first moves,
and she can carry the males live sperm around with
her for up to two years before she uses it
to fertilize her eggs. She's got some tens of thousands
of eggs though, so she might collect sperm from multiple
(18:26):
males before she goes ahead with fertilization. And oh man,
the baby's The baby's survival really depends on the environment
she chooses for them. So it's really good that she's picky,
because just two out of every fifty thousand eggs that
she lays will live long enough to become an adult
lobster of like catchable size. Yeah, every now and then
(18:47):
I have a moment of like we are a food show, right,
what's happening? I love it? But what's going on? What
the stuff exactly? H Speaking of growing, uh, lobsters can
regenerate their limbs. Um, they're they're not that attached to
(19:10):
their limbs literally. Oh yeah, they can detach a leg
or claw or antenna in an emergency. Um, just just
do it, just be like bloop by Um it's called
reflex amputation or or autotomy. And yeah, they just grow
it back during their next molting cycles. You know that
the shell comes off, they're growing a new shell, and
(19:31):
at the same time they go ahead and grow it back.
This is what Zoidberg was up to. Futurama. Probably it
sounds that sounds about so weird and squishy when he
doesn't have a shell. Oh yeah, yeah sure. Why is
all my knowledge based on cartoons Spongebobuturama. So my lobster
(19:57):
knowledge is coming room. And another word about those limbs, yes, yeah, um,
lobsters have a dominant front claw, meaning they're either right
claude or left claude. Oh my goodness. And um, the
dominant one is referred to as the crusher. It's a
little bit bigger and it's strong enough to to crack
open the shells of prey. And the smaller one, uh,
(20:19):
it's like smaller and more narrow. It's called the cutter
or the caesar um, and and it grabs food and
shreds it for consumption. Okay, so I correct my statement
because I have another bit of lobster information that I
got from a song that Google played for me today
because I had it on random and okay it was
it was called Lobster Domics and no, it was called
(20:42):
Claws Up by Lobster Domics, and it had this in
there about the dominant claw. Not to play it for
you later. It was I believe you have like a
nature background, like a nature narrator guy in the background,
like lobsters claw. But it was a rap song. Okay,
well that sounds fun. Lobsters lobster domas. I wonder if
(21:04):
all their songs are about lobsters. I hope so, I
sincerely hope so. I think his nickname was lobby Dobbs
lobby Dobs and there was a lot of Champagne references
in there. Anyway, if anyone wants to looking to, please
do and report back. Um, the word lobster comes from
(21:28):
an Old English word for spider, and this gave me
a whole new idea lobster man, spider man, but lobsterman. Yeah,
I think it's goutlesss we're really on a roll. It's
like a lobster heck, lobster fisher. Humans are are often
(21:51):
called lobster man. So oh good. I wasn't sure that.
I was like pretty sure it was a word because
I saw it in a couple of places. But that's
good to know that's going to use it later. Yeah. Um,
the way that the word lobster came about is is
pretty fun. Um specifically, so okay, So, ancient Romans called
lobsters locusta, which, yes, is the same route that we
(22:13):
get the modern English word locust from. And they actually
used that same word locusta to describe locusts as well.
I've seen conflicting reports about which came first, but either
way they would distinguish which creature they meant by saying
locusta of the sea or locusta of the land um.
In modern Spanish, by the way, the same word is
still used for both lingusta. Yeah, so why don't we
(22:39):
use the same word. And where does the whole spider
thing come in. Well, the word uh lopa or lope
maybe to mean spider insinuated dangly related to the word lobe,
is in like earlobe. Yeah, And as far as etomologists
can tell, these folks in medieval England just sort of
merged these two words for these two different hugs into
(23:01):
a new word uh lopestra um, perhaps because they thought
lobsters looked a bit like spiders and locusts. And yeah,
eventually that evolved into the word lobster. I mean, just
the fact that people are like, you know what this
thing looks like. It looks like if a spider met
all locusts. That says a lot to me right there.
(23:24):
It Uhum quick note about lobster Loves, Lobsterman, and lobster fishing. Um.
It is an amazingly involved venture. I feel like, I like,
I'd really love to do an interview about it at
some point. But from the brief research that I got into, like, Okay,
since lobsters can only be harvested once they're over a
certain size, traps have to have escape events that will
(23:46):
let smaller, younger lobsters come in eat the bait in
the trap and then leave unharmed. And Furthermore, since traps
are left out at sea and sometimes are lost, they're
required to have escape hatches for larger lobsters. Um that
the hatches will will biodegrade after a certain amount of
time to let to let a buddy get on with
its life if the trapper doesn't come back for it. Um. Yeah, yeah,
(24:09):
I don't know. Producer Andrew like, do you have any contexts?
Can you show us around Maine? I think he seems
like a person who has contexts. Yeah, well, what about
the nutrition of lobster on its own? Um, lobsters. After
we've just gone through all of these weird alien facts
about that? Then what about eating it? Um, A lobster
(24:31):
is pretty good for you. It's high in protein, it's
got a good smattering of vitamins and minerals. It's low
and fat, but it is high in cholesterol in sodium.
So like, don't overdo it on lobster if you're concerned
about your cardiovascular health, and be mindful that dressings like
butter and mayo can seriously up the calorie and fat
content of a meal. Yes, always, Um numbers numbers again
(24:55):
Red lobster episode speaking of adding butter in Man Maine
is largest lobster producer in the United States. That came
out to a historic one and thirty two point six
million pounds. The lobster is the state crustacean of Maine.
You got to have your state crustacean. You've got to
I believe five states do. Yes. Um. The American lobster
(25:18):
industry is worth some one point five billion dollars a year. Yes,
and lobster can be eaten in all kinds of ways,
plain or dipped in butter, on a lobster roll, in
a lobster bake, and mac and cheese. Frequently the surf
in Surf and Turf and then yeah, we've run into
a lot of lobster roll opinions, especially from super producer here. Okay, yeah,
(25:39):
so so the two main varieties are are served warm
huh with with butter or served cold with Mayo. I'm
all warm with butter kind of go oh yeah, that
probably surprises no one. Anyone who's listening to the Mayo
episode is like, obviously, oh that's true, that's true. I've
forgotten about that part. I think I'm I think I'm
(26:00):
a cold with Mayo. Yeah, I know, sorry about it.
I forget which one is correct. According to Andrew, he's
making he's making it do whatever you want Chester subjective. Yes,
I don't judge you. Yeah. The price of lobster is
(26:21):
different from a lot of products because there is no
government run pricing structure in place, meaning the price can
jump drastically in a short space of time up to
fourteen dollars a pound, and right now it's around eight
dollars a pound. And probably a lot of you have
this association as lobster is a nice food, share, something fancy,
(26:43):
something luxurious. Yes, I love this quote from Greg lwell
Over at the Oklahoma gazette. Lobster is fancy. If you
imagine a lobster talking, it probably has a British accent.
Drawn animated lobster, and I bet you'll include a top hat,
a monocle, and an operacake. Just so interesting because the
cartoon ones aren't that scary looking. Yeah, they're a lot cuter,
(27:05):
that's in general cartoon Yeah. Well, I mean just you
cut down on the number of like stuff coming out
of their faces, and I think it's automatically a little
bit less creepy. Yes, well, because yeah, if I imagine
like a real lobster with a monocle and it different things.
But lobsters used to be called, in fact, the cockroaches
(27:30):
from the ocean, and now they're like straight up money. Yeah,
how did that happen? Well, we'll tell you. But first
we're going to take a quick break for a word
from our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you sponsoring, Yes,
(27:52):
thank you. Um During the break, I want to point
out that that Andrew gave us a couple more lobster
pop culture references. UM one is Lobster Johnson, the character
the superhero based on lobsters from the hell Boy comic
book series. Yeah, and the other is um is a
Godzilla monster by the name of a bira um, which,
(28:15):
if you're familiar with Japanese abby means shrimp. But it's
it's a lobster, he says. And that name is killing me.
It's killing me. It's so cute. I know, I look
that up after this. Yeah, he says. It's his favorite
Godzilla movies, so high highly recommend. It might be a
little wise, but still worth checking out. I'm demping on
(28:35):
a chain out. Anyway, Let's get into history, because this
one is an emotional roller coaster. Yea, so prepare yourselves. Yes, okay,
So Europeans were eating lobster way wait, wait, way back
before they made the journey to the America's probably since
they realized lobsters were a thing. Um people in what
is now you're eight lobsters. Some experts think, if you
(28:57):
remember in our oyster episode, that those mid those piles
they found from like forever, those might have had lobster
shells in them as well. But they're not as sure
because they do look a little interesting, shall we say,
But yes, Europe specifically eight the European lobster, the blue lobster,
(29:18):
the Breton lobster has a lot of names, and this
lobster is a bit rarer than the main variety and
was seen as kind of a fancy thing, and from
what I read, still is and that's more so than
here in the I say, it's like a special occasion
fancy thing. Okay, Yes, the ancient Greeks and Romans certainly
were familiar with lobsters. Plenty of the elder wrote about
the lobster. Yeah, he described them by appearance in natural
(29:42):
history and a long list of sea creatures. In translation,
he wrote, black elephants of the lobster kind, having four
forked legs. They also have two arms, each with double joints,
and a single pair of pinchers, having a toothed edge.
Black elephants of the lobster kind. That's awesome. I'm not
sure if that's a weird miss translation or i'd like
(30:03):
if it's meant to be the word locusts or anyway. Um. However,
note about all of this ancient Greek and Roman stuff that,
as we mentioned in our crawfish episode, around that time,
the same words were often used interchangeably for freshwater crawfish
and salt water lobsters. Of various sorts um and sometimes
even for crabs. Yeah, mysteries, histories, confusion of bounds. During
(30:28):
medieval times, lobsters were seen as medicinal and as an
aphrodisiac surprise, but also has food, frequently boiled and eaten
cold with some vinegar. By the seventeenth century, the feast
of upper class Europeans might have featured lobster, and it
definitely featured in their paintings. By sixteen forties, the English
(30:49):
word for lobster was sometimes used as slang for British soldiers.
I think, usually derogatorially um first because of the jointed
iron armor of a specific class of soldier, but it
would come back later like a me or twenty years
later and uh and further on because of British red coats. Yes. Yes,
(31:09):
Native Americans used lobster as bait when they fished, as fertilizer,
and they ate them too. They would wrap them and
seaweed and cook them on hot stones, and as the
legend goes, this is where the clam bake comes from.
Future episode. When European settlers first arrived to North America,
some reported such a dearth of lobsters that they would
(31:32):
pile up on the shore up to two ft or
point six meters. Because they were so plentiful, they of
course became known as a food for the four When
new colonists arrived at Plymouth in the governor of Plymouth
Plantations said, to his shame, all they quote could present
(31:53):
their friends with was a lobster, without bread or anything
else but a cup of fair water. It was only
a lobster. This was it. For a while, lobsters were
simply gathered by hand at the shore. Towards the end
of the seventeenth century, lobsters in Maine came up with
these tanks that had holes in them to allow for
(32:16):
seawater circulation, called smacks with transporting live lobster in mind.
The fellows who worked on these ships were dubbed smack
h yes, m hmm. In the nineteenth century we see
the advent of lobster trapping in Maine. In eighteen seventy six,
the first lobster pound opened in that state, and by
this time there were several lobster canneries in Maine, and yes,
(32:40):
up until about the nineteen forties, American consumers could purchase
lobster in a can cheaply, cheaply, like one five of
the price of a can of Boston baked beans, like
people used it to feed their cats. Important to note
that this is when we cooked dead lobster, not a
(33:00):
live lobster, and also important to note lobsters were like
big back then in size. For a minute, lobsters five
pounds or less were considered too small for factories to process. Um,
but they changed their tune when the factories proved too
efficient to keep that standard in place. M hmm. Lobster
(33:20):
was so readily available and therefore cheap, that it was
frequently fed to prisoners. It was prison food, slaves, apprentices,
and children. In Massachusetts, some servants would put lines in
their contracts stating shellfish could only be on the menu
for them twice or maybe three times a week because
they were getting fed at all the time. UM. Lobster
(33:42):
shells around a house reviewed as signs of poverty. However,
here's this interesting take bit. Sometime in the mid eighteen eighties,
French poet Gerards did Nival was allegedly witnessed walking a
lobster up the ups at the Palais Royal. When asked
(34:02):
about it, he said quote how is a lobster more
ridiculous than a dog, a cat, a gazelle, a lion,
or any other animal. I have an affinity for lobsters.
They're easy going and serious. They know the secrets of
the sea, and they don't bark. But I can't argue
with any of his logic. Lobsters indeed do not bark.
(34:24):
They're easy going, serious. But he's going, you know, I,
I guess it's not going to complain that hard. So
it's gonna be like, how are getting up this time?
Not sure? I'm confused by all of this. I'm confused,
but desperately hoping it's true. During the eighties, lobster's reputation
(34:47):
started to turn around, especially in cities like New York
and Boston. The price began to increase. Another part of
this price increase had to do with the introduction of
trains and railways traversing the country, and that meant that
people who hadn't had lobster before I didn't know what
it was and could be convinced that it was extremely rare.
(35:08):
Oh yeah, special trains served it as though it were exotic.
Passengers loved it. They had no idea it was considered
a quote trash food. They just thought, I've never had
this before. I like it, I would like to have
more of it. Yeah. Growing Northeastern beach tourism also helped.
As more people came to the beaches, they were like, oh,
(35:30):
what is this? This is great. Chefs realized that lobster
looked and tasted better if it was cooked alive as
opposed to dead. Beginning in the eighteen fifties and sixties,
consumers could find a lobster in the salad section, and people, yeah,
they really liked lobster, even this cheap salad bar kind
and demand kept going up. Number of lobsters kept going down,
(35:55):
price kept going up. Lobster reached its first peak price
in the nineteen twenties, and it's around where it is today.
That's how it was then. But then alone comes the
Great Depression to rain on the lobster parade and pretty
much everything else. It was a luxury no one could afford.
So what happened. It went back to the canneries. A
(36:17):
protein source for soldiers during the World Wars from this
two thousand six Mother Jones article quote. In ninety four,
soldiers sat in foxholes in France eating lobster so strange
the lobster population was able to recover during this time.
In some places, during the Great Depression, particularly in Maine,
lobster was still viewed as a food for the poor.
(36:39):
Some lobster trappers might sneak up to a trap at
night to get the catchup lobster and reset the trap,
and then take those lobsters home that night to feed
their family. Children who went to school with lobster in
their sandwiches might be made fun of. The first documented
case of a lobster roll is from out of Milford, Connecticut.
(37:00):
It steamed lobster meat soaked in butter, served in a
warm hot dog bun with a side of chips or fries,
and it was pretty immediately but stay fairly local at first.
In nineteen sixty five, a Long Island became infatuated with
a lobster salad roll a sand which founded a restaurant
called the Lobster. In the seventies, roads stands in Maine
(37:23):
started serving lobster meat with butter and hot dog buns,
and the bun are bread was and usually still is
frequently toasted or grilled. During World War Two, a lobster
was not rationed, which meant folks from all walks were
discovering are perhaps rediscovering their love of lobster. It was
until the fifties that lobster started to move back into
(37:45):
that delicacy column, A food for celebrities, well off folks
served it at parties or at weddings. Between nineteen fifty
and nineteen seventy, over fishing drastically bumps up the price
until authorities stepped in to regulate it and things gradually
even back out. And then two four David Foster Wallace
(38:07):
published his peace Consider the Lobster. Uh. Yeah. This was
an essay originally appearing in Gourmet magazine that covered the
two thousand three Main Lobster Festival and is a perhaps
intriguing and also perhaps less than entirely scientific take on
on lobsters sentience. Yeah. It's available online if you want
to read it. Yeah. Climate change, modern le has been
(38:32):
changing lobster's habitat and behavior. Around the year two thousand,
the lobster fishing market in the in the southern More
parts of New England crashed. Um. They just weren't catching
enough to make do in rising ocean temperatures in the
Gulf of Maine causes lobster population to rise because they
dig warmish water and the price to plummet. But yeah,
(38:53):
the population is behaving a little bit strangely like it.
It makes sense that lobsters are migrating further north as
the previously two hold temperatures in the Gulf of Maine
start warming up a bit, and it makes sense that
they're thriving in this new environment. But um, But even
though the adults are thriving, the number of baby lobsters
in the Gulf of Maine has dropped by half in
the past decade. It's it's possible. Researchers think that shifting
(39:15):
wind and ocean currents may be pulling lobster larva out
out of the Gulf into the deeper water oh or
um or they might just be hatching further up north
now along the coast of Canada. A new study suggests
that over the next three decades, the lobster population in
the Gulf of Maine will shrink. Who that is a lot. Yeah. Uh.
(39:38):
In Switzerland and Italy both put laws in place requiring
crustaceans to be kept alive in like normal water conditions,
not on ice during transport and that they be stunned
before they're killed. And this brings us to today, and
are the recent hubbub about giving lobsters cannabis? What? Yes,
(40:00):
I have not heard of this, My goodness. What's up
with lobsters in cannabis? Well, it relates really well into
your size portion. But it was, you know, take the
edge off before boiling them. And I believe it was
a place in New York was starting to do it
and they've been asked by health officials to not do
(40:20):
it anymore. Um I okay, that's sure. Well it does
segue really nicely in your science, it does, it does. Um.
But but first we're gonna we're going to segue into
one more quick break for a word from our sponsor,
(40:48):
and we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you, And
we're back with a lobster science. So okay, the big one,
the big question is cooking lobsters alive cruel? The short
answer is that the science jury is still out. Um.
But but okay, let's let's go. Let's go through the
(41:09):
evidence and what people are thinking about. So uh. An
initial point of clarity here, lobsters do not have vocal
cords nor any other way of vocalizing. They do not bark. Um.
They can click their claws and legs together real good,
But like, that's it. So the sound that a lobster
makes when you drop it in a pot of boiling
water is not a scream. Um. It's most likely moisture
(41:32):
inside the shell coming to a boil and escaping a
steam under high pressure, like the like the whale of
a tea kettle. Yeah. Um. The problem here is that
the question of whether lobsters feel pain, and therefore whether
boiling them alive is cruel, is essentially unanswerable because it
ties into a larger unanswered question of how pain works. Um.
(41:56):
Because okay, the way that we humans experience pain is
super complex. For example, when we accidentally grab a hot pan,
it's it's not just that we're experiencing this negative stimulus,
we're we're also upset about it. The parts of our
nervous system that tell us, oh hot, hot, drop, drop
that thing, get away, um, and the ones that tell us, dang,
(42:19):
that is an injury do not damage it more. They're
both tied into other parts of our nervous system that
process emotion and memory. So we experienced the initial pain,
and we experience hurt a meaning pain not from the
original source, but rather from our body reminding us that
we've taken damage. Um, and we're like mad or sad
(42:41):
about it. And and further, being mad or sad about
it can make us experience pain and hurt more acutely,
especially with repeated exposure over the long term. So we
know that lobsters do experience that first part, that they'll
move away from a source of pain just like we will.
(43:02):
What we're not sure about is whether they experience those
other two, that the hurt and the emotion, because like
lobsters don't have brains the way that we consider them.
They do have a bunch of brainy bits that are
all tied together, but but they don't have a brain
that we that we consider it. Um. Studies have shown
that crustaceans will remember and avoid sources of pain, but
(43:24):
it's really hard to say whether that's a reflex or
something more complicated. If this is a thing that concerns you,
but you would still like to eat lobsters, sometimes you're
not alone. Um And yeah, there there are a couple
of practices that are considered more humane that some researchers
recommend other than pot Um, you can you can chill
(43:46):
or or ice down a lobster before you cook it,
and that can maybe put it into like a sort
of sleep state and let it go more gentle into
that good butter sauce. Um. The chilling has been shown
to reduce in pop movement from from six to ninety
seconds down to about twenty seconds um. And some restaurants
do employ a machine called a crustas doun which delivers
(44:10):
this strong electric shock to quickly kill shellfish before they're boiled.
Decapitation also works at that point. Wow, Yeah, I feel
like they've moved into something. In general, decapitation works pretty okay. Yeah,
except with hydra is a whole other episode. I'm unprepared
(44:36):
to talk about hydra. All return to that topic. Okay. Um,
Although all of this does beg the question, um, is
it even necessary to boil lobsters alive? Like? What impact
does alive versus dead versus frozen have on the consumers
experience of eating the lobster? And the answer here is
(44:59):
the it. The reason that lobsters are either transported live
or are cut into sections and frozen is because um,
parts of the lobster that we don't usually eat, like
the guts and the brain bits do spoil very much
faster than the meaty tail and claws, and will produce
um spoilage or the very best off flavors in in
(45:21):
the parts that we do eat. So like, you can't
really kill and fresh store lobsters the way that you
can shrimp or chicken. And I will say that the
texture of a fresh lobster is much nicer. The texture
and flavor is much nicer than that of previously frozen lobster.
So sciences looking into it, I suppose yeah, yeah, Like
(45:47):
I like, I've never I never liked lobster growing up.
I never got it. I never understood why people were
willing to pay so much for it, because I was like, this,
if the best part of this experience is the butter
that you dip it in, why are you just dipping
like bread or something else in butter? You can get
many things in butter that are less expensive. Um. And
then I went to a seaside town in Maine, and
(46:08):
I had a lobster roll that first of all, cost
like less than twenty five dollars, like perhaps seven and um,
seven dollars, and and was just so full of such fresh, tender,
delicious lobster. And I'm just like, oh, oh this is
the thing, this is what help welp. Yeah, it's funny
(46:32):
because I remember being at the fancy restaurant my life
read lobster, and I would never order the lobster because
that's too fit, that's too fancy. I couldn't go that far,
be ridiculous, right right, I'll take the chicken. Everyone will
judge me. I think I can eat lobster. I did
order lobster bis because even though I didn't realize this
(46:54):
was what Elaine was joking about in the time a
Sign Felt episode. But when she yatt a yachted sex
and Jerry said, you yatta yatta the best part, and
she said, I mentioned the lobster bis. So I was like, well,
I don't know what that means, but I'm gonna wear
And it was good. I mean it was just like
a ton of butter sure, yeah, cream, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Anyway,
(47:19):
I when I was researching this, something that came up
that I'm sure some people remember but I don't at all.
Is this whole question of whether or not lobsters can
write with a pen. Oh, there's a Snoop's article about it.
There's a video that went viral of a lobster seeming
(47:40):
to write, but Snopes broke it down and it seems
like it's an app and it was all a big trick.
Yep curses who was like, Convince, everyone loves just gonna write.
I don't know. I love it though, if it's a
slow like it's when you're an evil villain and you
got to start out small, star small, try different things, sticks,
(48:03):
work your way up to kidnapping and murder, learn about
human nature. Believe this lobster video, lobster can write, Okay,
make a note the Evil League of Evil will we'll
we'll take We'll take you. At that point, I think yeah.
Um other important question, do lobsters live forever? Um? Well,
(48:24):
the answered the answers now. Essentially, lobsters do not age
the way that we humans do. Given the right circumstances,
they don't stop growing and and they'll you know, continue
molting and growing for decades and they won't lose their
their strength or their cardiovascular health because it's not really
cardiovascular at that point. Um or their ability to reproduce
(48:44):
the way that we will researchers think that they do
eventually like run low on energy, maybe due to a
food supply and demand issue to keep them running at
those increasing sizes, or maybe they'll they'll get sick and
they won't be able to mold, like their shell will stick,
which leads to fatal complications. So they do die of
natural causes, just not the same natural causes that we
(49:06):
die of. Yeah yeah, because yeah uh, and lobster shells
are really cool. Um okay, so some some materials scientists
have been looking specifically at the shells of lobsters underbellies.
Um so, so the top, the top of lobster shells
(49:26):
in their claws are made of this very hard material.
It's fairly inflexible. It it'll it'll crack under pressure. You've
probably noticed that if you have ever deconstructed a lobster
to con assume um. But their bellies are are shelled
in with this more flexible stuff. It's made of kiton
but also like water, and it's constructed in these in
these micro layers sort of like a plywood or carbon fiber.
(49:50):
Each layer has fibers of kyton running through them and
and and each layers is offset from the last at
a slightly different angle, So the fibers run sort of
cross wise layer to layer, and and this is cool
for two reasons. First off, it means that if you
cut a gouge at the material, you're only going to
get through a few of these little micro layers before
(50:11):
the angle of the others start making it real hard
to keep going. Um. And second, the material can be
stretched to almost twice its length before it starts to
go stiff and get breakable. Uh. The researchers said, it's
it's as tough as the stuff that we used to make,
like garden hoses and conveyor belts and car tires. Wow.
Uh So I really hope that something based on this design,
(50:35):
or just something made out of lobster belly shell yeah,
comes out later. I love biomemetics. It's a really fascinating
field by memetics being a design based on biological systems.
I hope that, um, that car that looks like a
lobster was one day made out of that stuff, and
(50:55):
then you would really not want to run into that guy.
Oh man, it's like a tank hell exactly like that. Yes, yeah,
ideas lobster truck. I can't remember the name of lobster mania.
Uh yeah, so that's that's I think, that's what I think.
(51:17):
That's what I've got about lobsters. We got all have
to say about lobster Yeah, this is the longest episode
we've had in a minute, and I think we could
have kept going. Oh, I had to stop myself. As
as it is, I think I went on too long.
I did not get my other homework done for the day.
But um, you gotta consider it. You gotta consider the
(51:39):
lobster Well, this brings us to norm that sounds Widberg makes.
Oh I can't. I can't reproduce it personally. Where I
gotta add it through my is some impressions ever growing
(52:04):
and not. I'm not marking anything off perfect. Yes, all right,
Samantha wrote, I'm currently binging the show a bit to
catch up, back up, since I fell behind. I'm on
the chocolate chip cookie episode. Since I still had the
natilla episode in the brain, I thought i'd share with
you wonderful, delicious concoction. My husband came up with fun
(52:25):
fetty natle cookies. Yes, it's as good as it sounds.
He freezes small dabs and to tell us so that
they're solid enough to handle, then makes the fun fetty
cake mix into cookie mix, and each cookie he stuffs
in a tell ball, totally encasing it in the cookie dough.
The result is a delicious cookie with melty, delicious Natalia inside.
(52:46):
I'm sure it would work with other sugar cookie variations,
but it's more fun with fun. I mean it's in
the name. It's so delightful. I've done that once with
like a cupcake and I put cookie, don't want the cupcake,
but I've never done this. Yeah, experiments excellent, Allen wrote,
(53:08):
I would like to make a few observations after after
listening to your recent podcast on m R E s.
I speak from over forty two years of eating field
rations in one sort or another, from cans to the
modern iterations of US and Canadian rations. Along the way,
I've had a chance to try British, German and French rations.
The first thing to say is that today's m R.
E s are vastly improved over the old canned rations.
(53:31):
Ham and egg, omelet and chicken bits in a slimy
gelatine come to mind. The second point I would like
to make is that means of heating them have also varied.
Early rations had hexamine heating tablets, which gave most of
the food a unique chemical taste. The meal pouches have
also been heated on top of lights and office trailers,
(53:51):
or on top of engine manifolds. Some were riskier than
other methods. A preferred method was a pot of boiling
water or a pressure cooker. The modern self heating pouch
has done away with much of the uncertainty about heating
the meals. However, an awful lot of them are eaten cold.
As great as the modern rations are and the variety available,
(54:11):
it still doesn't preclude with an outpost getting a few
weeks of rations with a couple of meal choices. Imagine
three meals a day with the same menu for a
couple of weeks. Even poached salmon will be tiresome. Ah yeah, yeah, yeah,
I can imagine, I can I can see that. Oh absolutely,
(54:33):
And variety, y'all. It's delicious. It's important. It is important.
I've been really appreciating everybody who wrote in about their
m e oh goodness mm hmmmmmm. So expect some more
of those over the coming weeks. But in the meantime
we would like to thank both of them for writing
in and if you would like to write to us,
(54:53):
you can yeah. Our email is Hello at saborpod dot com.
We're also on social media. You can find us on
s book, Twitter, and Instagram at savor Pod. We do
hope to hear from you. Savor is a production of
I Heart Radio and Stuff Media. For more podcasts from
my heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thanks as
(55:15):
always to our super producers Andrew Howard and Dylan Pagan.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way
Hello, and welcome to Savor Protection. If I heart radio
and stuff media, I'm Annies and I'm Lauren Vocal Bomb.
And today we're talking about lobsters. Yes, it is a
very very exciting day here. It is. Uh. First of all,
super producer Andrew is from Maine. Um. He has a
pervasive fondness for for lobsters and distinct opinions about the
(00:30):
lobster role he does. I am a little concerned we
will get in trouble with super Producer Andrew Um. And
I just wanted to say that while we were in Hawaii,
he purchased probably the coolest lobster magnet that exists. Yeah. Yeah,
it's all weekly. It's high quality. Uh. I mean that's
(00:50):
the color of a of a lobster like in the water.
Basically it's true. But that night, it was a magical night,
and that lobster was there for most of it. Was
there last night in Hawaii. Yes, yes, Um. I had
a friend in high school who actually she I knew
her from. I knew her from when she was four.
(01:11):
But I remember in high school thinking how bizarre to
me it was that on Thanksgiving they would get lobster
in that way instead of Turkey have lobster. Okay, Thanksgiving dinner? Cool?
They were from the North, Okay, I've I haven't heard
of people doing that. But it makes perfect sense, I suppose.
(01:31):
You know. What doesn't make perfect sense is why the
world hasn't see that picture of you as a lobster, Lauren,
because I've been slacking. Oh no, no, we must see. Yeah.
I wish I had video of it because because like
this lobster magnet, like the little legs were Okay. So
this one time I was, I was I was working
(01:53):
for gel haven't heard the story. I was working with
a with a medical journal of course as a copy editor.
We had an annual convention that we helped that the
company ran, where like fourteen thousand drheumatologists would descend upon
a city and and every year we would you know,
market for the next year's convention. And one year, my
(02:14):
first year with the company, we were in d C.
The next year the convention was going to be in Boston.
Lobsters are in Boston, and so the marketing material had
lobsters on it, and one of the higher ups got
this idea that we should give away a ticket to
next year's convention by dressing up some Porschemo in a
full body lobster suit and have them yeah go hand
(02:37):
out a free ticket to next year. And one one
day I was that schmo and how was it? Uh,
you know, it was heck and great um, to be honest,
like this suit was it was. It was really lightweight.
It was a little bit warm, um. But but the
cool part was that the you know, your your your
arms are in the claws and the elbows, like like
(02:58):
right where your elbow is, right at the joint of
the of the cloth. Yeah, it had a string like
a fishing line that ran down to all of the
little legs coming off of the belly of the suit.
So so when so if you put your arms a
kimbo and you wiggle them, all the little legs would
wiggle because they're attached to the strings. Some craftsmanship. It
was great. I was. I was. I mean also, like
(03:22):
you know, like I was just tickled by the experience.
I didn't have to do it more than once, which helped.
But right right, I bet you brought a lot of joy,
perhaps fear, I hope less fear and more joy. I
definitely like got a really great picture of it that
I put on my Christmas card for that year. The
inscription on the inside of the Christmas card was and
(03:44):
you thought that my degree in English wouldn't get me anywhere?
See that's wonderful, But I was technically working in my field.
There you go. You see, sometimes your job calls you
calls me dress up and alps, you're outfit. We all
know it. It could happen to either one of us
any day. Now. Oh gosh, I'm honestly surprised it hasn't.
(04:07):
I am too. I feel like beIN Boland probably has
done it. Oh I don't know. I know he's done
a hot dog. Well, it's bound to happen if it
hasn't already. Yeah. And didn't you get like a lobster
stuffed animal? Oh gosh, yeah, I sorry. So after this Christmas,
this whole incident, like it sort of became a meme
(04:29):
of Lauren and some of my friends did in fact
get me a like toddler or bigger sized stuffed lobster toy?
Oh my goodness. That it was holding a big heart,
I think, and it had these creepy eyes with all
this eyeshadow on them or I don't know, and and
(04:51):
these big red lips and and the heart said, um,
love Lobster of yours, And eventually I was just like,
I don't need this in my home anymore, but it's
going to show up again one day. Oh gosh, I'm
the curstall. I really I would. I'll take Annabelle look
(05:12):
like I This thing was not my favorite. My roommate
at the time was incredulous, like like, you can't get
rid of the love Lobster. And I was like, you
watch me, you take it right, it can go in
your room. He was like no. I was like, well, no,
(05:34):
the Sisterhood of the Traveling Mobster, that's what it could be.
I hope it's somebody has it and it's made their day.
I mean I donated it, so who knows if anyone
listening happens to have it. Oh my gosh, right, and
I believe it was available for purchase at like Walgreens
or something like that around Valentine's Day, So maybe someone
(05:56):
else has seen it. If you're like significant other gave
you a love lobster, I can't imagine getting that. I
might really like it. It's hard to say. It was
pretty creepy. I don't think I have a picture of it,
but I'll see what I can do. Okay, we need
the picture of you in it and the love Lobster,
Love Lobster. It sounds like a show. It is seen
(06:17):
as very romantic, which I always thought was weird because
there's are any other food I can't imagine, but a
few that look as gross. Was trying to crack open
like a lobster in the amount of work, and like, yeah,
I always end up cutting myself blood involved. It's like
a weird ritual. Now. I mean, I'm not going to
(06:37):
tell you how to do your love life, but I
like I like a slightly gentler meal personally, No love
lobster for us. WHOA, My my experience with lobster is
not nearly as exciting. You can hear some of it
in our Red Lobster episode. It was like that was
(06:58):
the fancy restaurant in my life. But I do have
a lot of cultural notes immediately that I thought of, Um,
Number one, Larry the Lobster from SpongeBob. Oh okay, yeah, Wikipedia,
The first thing that comes up. I type in Larry
the Lobster from Wikipedia. Residents four or five seven, life drive, interest, weightlifting, surfing, girls, occupation,
(07:21):
weightlifter lifeguard. It's like he's a real person Wikipedia. And
then there's the infamous sign felled lobster episode. That's the
one with the shrinkage if you know what I mean lobsters,
The Friends episode about you know, She's your lobster, the
movie by the same name, The Lobster. Yeah, I will
(07:42):
say Phoebe was incorrect. Lobster relationships really only last like
ten to fourteen days my whole that's the foundation of
of the lobster episode of Friends. I know in my relationship.
This is why I haven't made it very far. Taking
relationship advice from friends is not a good idea. What
I will think about that later. But right now, let's
(08:04):
get to our question because the answer is fascinating. Oh yes, lobsters.
What are they? Well, a few different animals that humans
eat are referred to as lobsters, but they're all crustaceans,
that is, types of arthropods, which are creatures that wear
(08:24):
their skeletons around on the outside of their bodies instead
of on the inside. There is the American lobster, and
the one which we will be mostly concerned with today,
that's a Homarus americanus, a cold water creature ten legs total,
with claws on the first four, including a large asymmetrical
pair right up front. Um. They're generally a modeled greenish
(08:46):
or brownish color, though they can come in combinations of
that plus or minus, like yellow and orange and blue
or even red. Though their shells turn red during cooking
because the heat breaks down. These bonds lock up this
one pigment with proteins in their shells that make it
look green brown. Thus, released by the heat, the pigment
looks red. The pigment in question is acts as xanthin,
(09:09):
which is a carrotenoid see our carrot episode. Um. Yeah,
it's found in plants which are eaten by the lobsters. Prey, carrot, yep,
yep yep. Then there is the European lobster that's Hamrus gammarus.
It's very similar to the American lobster except for a
for coloration. They're dark blue with kind of cream spotting
and like a like a yellow or pinkish belly. H
(09:32):
Then there's a spiny lobster comes from a whole different
biological family. These are warm water creatures spiny uh no
pronounced claws not a rock, but a rock lobster. Oh
my goodness, I think the podcast is over. That that
(09:53):
was one step too far. I never know it was
gonna be the B fifty two all this time. Yes,
um uh yeah, this is going to be a whole
different episode. Really, but I did want to put in
here that spiny lobsters migrate as cold water lobsters tend
to as well. Um, but they navigate the spiny lobster
(10:14):
via magnetic reception um, meaning that they can sense the
Earth's magnetic fields, meaning that their bodies contain some magnetic
material for that sensory input, although probably not enough for
lobster to stick to magnet And I don't know how
many of y'all are old enough to remember that whole video,
(10:35):
but oh, lobster sticks to magnet is a thing you
don't No, I did not know. Oh gosh, you can.
You can look it up. I immediately was thinking, so
magneto can't, Like, why have we not seen magneto lobsters. Yeah,
that seems like a really big missed opportunity. I think
that we should call somebody. Ian McKellen. I'm on a number.
(11:01):
He'll yeah, he'll be like this. Oh, I would love
to see that goodness. Um. But but yeah, other lobsters
are being investigated for for this potential property since they
do also migrate. But you know, science is looking into
it as they should. We mostly eat the large, unfatty,
(11:25):
white colored muscles that are found in lobsters tails and claws. Um.
It's a mild and slightly sweet flavored meat with a
little bit of like briny sea flavor to it, and
it can taste a little bit musky or fishy as well. Um. Yeah,
lobsters they look like a face hugger, tastes like the ocean.
They do look like a face hugger. You're right, they're
The more pictures that I looked of at them during
(11:46):
this research, the more I was like, oh god, they're
scary they are looking but pretty cool. Yes, Oh gosh,
it could have rest this forever. Okay, Uh, lobster size,
so this is a cool thing. Um Okay. By law
(12:07):
in the United States, lobster is gonna be harvested once
they're over one pound by weight that's a little bit
under half a kilo. And there's some cost benefit analysis
in there. You want to let them live long enough
to propagate, um and to be worth the effort of
catching um. Like, even a one pound lobster only contains
about one fifth of a pound of meat, so yeah,
smaller than that. It's like, why are you bothering? And Okay.
(12:29):
The cool part about this is the way that lobsters
grow is uh, you know, as they grow their their
squishy bodies get too big for their hard shells, and
so they molt and grow a new shell. They usually
eat the old shell for fuel, like immediate laid because
it is hungry work building a shell, and those shells
are rich in calcium. So gross, I love it. I
(12:53):
love it. Uh. And it takes a lobster twenty to
thirty malts over the course of its first five to
seven years to reach that one pound size. After that,
they slow their molting process a little bit. That's like
they're kind of like entrance into adulthood when they may
be only malt like once a year. They slow their molds. Yeah,
slow their malt. Oh my goodness. But um, but lobsters
(13:15):
can get big. Yes I can. I'm sorry the image
in my head. I gotta shake that, okay. Yes. The
largest lobster on record was caught in off the coast
of Nova Scotia. It weighed forty four pounds, which is
about twenty kilos, and was forty two inches long about
one hundred and seven cimeters. That is like just over
(13:36):
three ft or one meter. Like that's the size of
a long toddler. Like that's enormous. I would think I
had discovered some kind of alien creatures for sure. And
scientists think it was one hundred years old, which is
double the lifespan of your usual lobster m shellfish of
a certainty that they say, um, younger American lobsters tend
(14:00):
to stay mostly in like warmish inshore waters, but older
ones will venture out into the deep sea and yes
do my great seasonally. The record for migration is two
miles in a single year for this one specimen that
was tagged off of the continental shelf in the Atlantic
and found again in Long Island, New York. WHOA, Yeah,
(14:21):
good for you, buddy. Yeah getting around And yes, okay,
I've got some lobster facts for you. Yeah, yeah, they're weird,
They're weird. This was weird. Lobster facts was the subject
of my very first list show video, What the Stuff,
which I accidentally named after uh A lumpy Space Princess
(14:44):
line from uh Adventure Purpose super accidentally, Like, I was
just like spitting out all of these stuff related titles
and I was just like, what the stuff? That's funny?
And yeah, then I don't know, like a couple of
weeks later, I was a you watching an episode and
she was like, what the stuff fin and I was like, oh, man, well,
(15:05):
anyway I remember that video. Um so yes. Lobster facts. Okay,
first of all, let's talk about how lobsters eat and digest.
The cold water American lobster is mostly nocturnal and is
a carnivore. It hunts fish and shell fish and will
definitely kill and eat other lobsters, though that happens more
often with lobsters kept captive in close quarters then out
(15:29):
in the world. And they will eat plants too, but
they prefer meat. Yeah, lobsters have two stomachs. The first
stomach is located in in the thorax what would consider
the lobster's head, like right behind its eyes, and it
contains these teeth like things called a gastric mill that
crushed the lobster's prey. And yes, it looks vaguely like
a scar lock if that's if you're trying to picture it. Um.
(15:53):
Once the food is ground, fine, it passes through to
the second stomach, which is this large digestive gland. That
that that filters smaller bits, which are more likely to
be nutritive, out from the larger bits which are to
be excreted like eventually, Um, the smaller bits going to
be processed by a gland called tomali or to molly. Uh,
not to Molly, that's different anyway. Um, it's got a
(16:16):
y at the end, which is sort of like our liver.
And uh, this this thing will turn green when you
cook a lobster, and it's sometimes considered an especial delicacy. Okay, yeah, Uh,
Lobsters probably don't see very well, but they make up
for it in terms of taste, smell, and touch. They
mostly get around through smell. In touch, lobsters p out
(16:39):
of their faces for emotional purposes. Yes, I I recently
had a couple of beers and was telling a stranger
all about this. Okay, it's intriguing. I can't say something
(17:00):
like that one to know more and not want to
know more, that's ridiculous. Okay, So, so lobsters excrete waste
from a few spots on their body, but they urinate
out of openings on their face called nephrophors. And this
isn't just about getting rid of bodily waste and other toxins.
(17:20):
UM lobsters urinate in each other's faces during fights, and
male lobsters are super fighty yeah um to to express themselves,
to express their full range of emotion about the experience UM,
and lady lobster's urine contains pheromones to get dude lobsters
like relaxed and in the mood. UM part. Part of
(17:42):
the lobster mating process involves the female lobster repeatedly peeing
into the shelter belonging to the male lobster that she's
hoping to mate with. That's a pretty clear signal that,
I mean, it's hard to miss that. You're like, welp,
something's up. I should go check this out. Speaking of
(18:04):
the reproduction process, UM, female lobsters practice reproductive planning. A
female lobster chooses her mate, she makes the first moves,
and she can carry the males live sperm around with
her for up to two years before she uses it
to fertilize her eggs. She's got some tens of thousands
of eggs though, so she might collect sperm from multiple
(18:26):
males before she goes ahead with fertilization. And oh man,
the baby's The baby's survival really depends on the environment
she chooses for them. So it's really good that she's picky,
because just two out of every fifty thousand eggs that
she lays will live long enough to become an adult
lobster of like catchable size. Yeah, every now and then
(18:47):
I have a moment of like we are a food show, right,
what's happening? I love it? But what's going on? What
the stuff exactly? H Speaking of growing, uh, lobsters can
regenerate their limbs. Um, they're they're not that attached to
(19:10):
their limbs literally. Oh yeah, they can detach a leg
or claw or antenna in an emergency. Um, just just
do it, just be like bloop by Um it's called
reflex amputation or or autotomy. And yeah, they just grow
it back during their next molting cycles. You know that
the shell comes off, they're growing a new shell, and
(19:31):
at the same time they go ahead and grow it back.
This is what Zoidberg was up to. Futurama. Probably it
sounds that sounds about so weird and squishy when he
doesn't have a shell. Oh yeah, yeah sure. Why is
all my knowledge based on cartoons Spongebobuturama. So my lobster
(19:57):
knowledge is coming room. And another word about those limbs, yes, yeah, um,
lobsters have a dominant front claw, meaning they're either right
claude or left claude. Oh my goodness. And um, the
dominant one is referred to as the crusher. It's a
little bit bigger and it's strong enough to to crack
open the shells of prey. And the smaller one, uh,
(20:19):
it's like smaller and more narrow. It's called the cutter
or the caesar um, and and it grabs food and
shreds it for consumption. Okay, so I correct my statement
because I have another bit of lobster information that I
got from a song that Google played for me today
because I had it on random and okay it was
it was called Lobster Domics and no, it was called
(20:42):
Claws Up by Lobster Domics, and it had this in
there about the dominant claw. Not to play it for
you later. It was I believe you have like a
nature background, like a nature narrator guy in the background,
like lobsters claw. But it was a rap song. Okay,
well that sounds fun. Lobsters lobster domas. I wonder if
(21:04):
all their songs are about lobsters. I hope so, I
sincerely hope so. I think his nickname was lobby Dobbs
lobby Dobs and there was a lot of Champagne references
in there. Anyway, if anyone wants to looking to, please
do and report back. Um, the word lobster comes from
(21:28):
an Old English word for spider, and this gave me
a whole new idea lobster man, spider man, but lobsterman. Yeah,
I think it's goutlesss we're really on a roll. It's
like a lobster heck, lobster fisher. Humans are are often
(21:51):
called lobster man. So oh good. I wasn't sure that.
I was like pretty sure it was a word because
I saw it in a couple of places. But that's
good to know that's going to use it later. Yeah. Um,
the way that the word lobster came about is is
pretty fun. Um specifically, so okay, So, ancient Romans called
lobsters locusta, which, yes, is the same route that we
(22:13):
get the modern English word locust from. And they actually
used that same word locusta to describe locusts as well.
I've seen conflicting reports about which came first, but either
way they would distinguish which creature they meant by saying
locusta of the sea or locusta of the land um.
In modern Spanish, by the way, the same word is
still used for both lingusta. Yeah, so why don't we
(22:39):
use the same word. And where does the whole spider
thing come in. Well, the word uh lopa or lope
maybe to mean spider insinuated dangly related to the word lobe,
is in like earlobe. Yeah, And as far as etomologists
can tell, these folks in medieval England just sort of
merged these two words for these two different hugs into
(23:01):
a new word uh lopestra um, perhaps because they thought
lobsters looked a bit like spiders and locusts. And yeah,
eventually that evolved into the word lobster. I mean, just
the fact that people are like, you know what this
thing looks like. It looks like if a spider met
all locusts. That says a lot to me right there.
(23:24):
It Uhum quick note about lobster Loves, Lobsterman, and lobster fishing. Um.
It is an amazingly involved venture. I feel like, I like,
I'd really love to do an interview about it at
some point. But from the brief research that I got into, like, Okay,
since lobsters can only be harvested once they're over a
certain size, traps have to have escape events that will
(23:46):
let smaller, younger lobsters come in eat the bait in
the trap and then leave unharmed. And Furthermore, since traps
are left out at sea and sometimes are lost, they're
required to have escape hatches for larger lobsters. Um that
the hatches will will biodegrade after a certain amount of
time to let to let a buddy get on with
its life if the trapper doesn't come back for it. Um. Yeah, yeah,
(24:09):
I don't know. Producer Andrew like, do you have any contexts?
Can you show us around Maine? I think he seems
like a person who has contexts. Yeah, well, what about
the nutrition of lobster on its own? Um, lobsters. After
we've just gone through all of these weird alien facts
about that? Then what about eating it? Um, A lobster
(24:31):
is pretty good for you. It's high in protein, it's
got a good smattering of vitamins and minerals. It's low
and fat, but it is high in cholesterol in sodium.
So like, don't overdo it on lobster if you're concerned
about your cardiovascular health, and be mindful that dressings like
butter and mayo can seriously up the calorie and fat
content of a meal. Yes, always, Um numbers numbers again
(24:55):
Red lobster episode speaking of adding butter in Man Maine
is largest lobster producer in the United States. That came
out to a historic one and thirty two point six
million pounds. The lobster is the state crustacean of Maine.
You got to have your state crustacean. You've got to
I believe five states do. Yes. Um. The American lobster
(25:18):
industry is worth some one point five billion dollars a year. Yes,
and lobster can be eaten in all kinds of ways,
plain or dipped in butter, on a lobster roll, in
a lobster bake, and mac and cheese. Frequently the surf
in Surf and Turf and then yeah, we've run into
a lot of lobster roll opinions, especially from super producer here. Okay, yeah,
(25:39):
so so the two main varieties are are served warm
huh with with butter or served cold with Mayo. I'm
all warm with butter kind of go oh yeah, that
probably surprises no one. Anyone who's listening to the Mayo
episode is like, obviously, oh that's true, that's true. I've
forgotten about that part. I think I'm I think I'm
(26:00):
a cold with Mayo. Yeah, I know, sorry about it.
I forget which one is correct. According to Andrew, he's
making he's making it do whatever you want Chester subjective. Yes,
I don't judge you. Yeah. The price of lobster is
(26:21):
different from a lot of products because there is no
government run pricing structure in place, meaning the price can
jump drastically in a short space of time up to
fourteen dollars a pound, and right now it's around eight
dollars a pound. And probably a lot of you have
this association as lobster is a nice food, share, something fancy,
(26:43):
something luxurious. Yes, I love this quote from Greg lwell
Over at the Oklahoma gazette. Lobster is fancy. If you
imagine a lobster talking, it probably has a British accent.
Drawn animated lobster, and I bet you'll include a top hat,
a monocle, and an operacake. Just so interesting because the
cartoon ones aren't that scary looking. Yeah, they're a lot cuter,
(27:05):
that's in general cartoon Yeah. Well, I mean just you
cut down on the number of like stuff coming out
of their faces, and I think it's automatically a little
bit less creepy. Yes, well, because yeah, if I imagine
like a real lobster with a monocle and it different things.
But lobsters used to be called, in fact, the cockroaches
(27:30):
from the ocean, and now they're like straight up money. Yeah,
how did that happen? Well, we'll tell you. But first
we're going to take a quick break for a word
from our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you sponsoring, Yes,
(27:52):
thank you. Um During the break, I want to point
out that that Andrew gave us a couple more lobster
pop culture references. UM one is Lobster Johnson, the character
the superhero based on lobsters from the hell Boy comic
book series. Yeah, and the other is um is a
Godzilla monster by the name of a bira um, which,
(28:15):
if you're familiar with Japanese abby means shrimp. But it's
it's a lobster, he says. And that name is killing me.
It's killing me. It's so cute. I know, I look
that up after this. Yeah, he says. It's his favorite
Godzilla movies, so high highly recommend. It might be a
little wise, but still worth checking out. I'm demping on
(28:35):
a chain out. Anyway, Let's get into history, because this
one is an emotional roller coaster. Yea, so prepare yourselves. Yes, okay,
So Europeans were eating lobster way wait, wait, way back
before they made the journey to the America's probably since
they realized lobsters were a thing. Um people in what
is now you're eight lobsters. Some experts think, if you
(28:57):
remember in our oyster episode, that those mid those piles
they found from like forever, those might have had lobster
shells in them as well. But they're not as sure
because they do look a little interesting, shall we say,
But yes, Europe specifically eight the European lobster, the blue lobster,
(29:18):
the Breton lobster has a lot of names, and this
lobster is a bit rarer than the main variety and
was seen as kind of a fancy thing, and from
what I read, still is and that's more so than
here in the I say, it's like a special occasion
fancy thing. Okay, Yes, the ancient Greeks and Romans certainly
were familiar with lobsters. Plenty of the elder wrote about
the lobster. Yeah, he described them by appearance in natural
(29:42):
history and a long list of sea creatures. In translation,
he wrote, black elephants of the lobster kind, having four
forked legs. They also have two arms, each with double joints,
and a single pair of pinchers, having a toothed edge.
Black elephants of the lobster kind. That's awesome. I'm not
sure if that's a weird miss translation or i'd like
(30:03):
if it's meant to be the word locusts or anyway. Um. However,
note about all of this ancient Greek and Roman stuff that,
as we mentioned in our crawfish episode, around that time,
the same words were often used interchangeably for freshwater crawfish
and salt water lobsters. Of various sorts um and sometimes
even for crabs. Yeah, mysteries, histories, confusion of bounds. During
(30:28):
medieval times, lobsters were seen as medicinal and as an
aphrodisiac surprise, but also has food, frequently boiled and eaten
cold with some vinegar. By the seventeenth century, the feast
of upper class Europeans might have featured lobster, and it
definitely featured in their paintings. By sixteen forties, the English
(30:49):
word for lobster was sometimes used as slang for British soldiers.
I think, usually derogatorially um first because of the jointed
iron armor of a specific class of soldier, but it
would come back later like a me or twenty years
later and uh and further on because of British red coats. Yes. Yes,
(31:09):
Native Americans used lobster as bait when they fished, as fertilizer,
and they ate them too. They would wrap them and
seaweed and cook them on hot stones, and as the
legend goes, this is where the clam bake comes from.
Future episode. When European settlers first arrived to North America,
some reported such a dearth of lobsters that they would
(31:32):
pile up on the shore up to two ft or
point six meters. Because they were so plentiful, they of
course became known as a food for the four When
new colonists arrived at Plymouth in the governor of Plymouth
Plantations said, to his shame, all they quote could present
(31:53):
their friends with was a lobster, without bread or anything
else but a cup of fair water. It was only
a lobster. This was it. For a while, lobsters were
simply gathered by hand at the shore. Towards the end
of the seventeenth century, lobsters in Maine came up with
these tanks that had holes in them to allow for
(32:16):
seawater circulation, called smacks with transporting live lobster in mind.
The fellows who worked on these ships were dubbed smack
h yes, m hmm. In the nineteenth century we see
the advent of lobster trapping in Maine. In eighteen seventy six,
the first lobster pound opened in that state, and by
this time there were several lobster canneries in Maine, and yes,
(32:40):
up until about the nineteen forties, American consumers could purchase
lobster in a can cheaply, cheaply, like one five of
the price of a can of Boston baked beans, like
people used it to feed their cats. Important to note
that this is when we cooked dead lobster, not a
(33:00):
live lobster, and also important to note lobsters were like
big back then in size. For a minute, lobsters five
pounds or less were considered too small for factories to process. Um,
but they changed their tune when the factories proved too
efficient to keep that standard in place. M hmm. Lobster
(33:20):
was so readily available and therefore cheap, that it was
frequently fed to prisoners. It was prison food, slaves, apprentices,
and children. In Massachusetts, some servants would put lines in
their contracts stating shellfish could only be on the menu
for them twice or maybe three times a week because
they were getting fed at all the time. UM. Lobster
(33:42):
shells around a house reviewed as signs of poverty. However,
here's this interesting take bit. Sometime in the mid eighteen eighties,
French poet Gerards did Nival was allegedly witnessed walking a
lobster up the ups at the Palais Royal. When asked
(34:02):
about it, he said quote how is a lobster more
ridiculous than a dog, a cat, a gazelle, a lion,
or any other animal. I have an affinity for lobsters.
They're easy going and serious. They know the secrets of
the sea, and they don't bark. But I can't argue
with any of his logic. Lobsters indeed do not bark.
(34:24):
They're easy going, serious. But he's going, you know, I,
I guess it's not going to complain that hard. So
it's gonna be like, how are getting up this time?
Not sure? I'm confused by all of this. I'm confused,
but desperately hoping it's true. During the eighties, lobster's reputation
(34:47):
started to turn around, especially in cities like New York
and Boston. The price began to increase. Another part of
this price increase had to do with the introduction of
trains and railways traversing the country, and that meant that
people who hadn't had lobster before I didn't know what
it was and could be convinced that it was extremely rare.
(35:08):
Oh yeah, special trains served it as though it were exotic.
Passengers loved it. They had no idea it was considered
a quote trash food. They just thought, I've never had
this before. I like it, I would like to have
more of it. Yeah. Growing Northeastern beach tourism also helped.
As more people came to the beaches, they were like, oh,
(35:30):
what is this? This is great. Chefs realized that lobster
looked and tasted better if it was cooked alive as
opposed to dead. Beginning in the eighteen fifties and sixties,
consumers could find a lobster in the salad section, and people, yeah,
they really liked lobster, even this cheap salad bar kind
and demand kept going up. Number of lobsters kept going down,
(35:55):
price kept going up. Lobster reached its first peak price
in the nineteen twenties, and it's around where it is today.
That's how it was then. But then alone comes the
Great Depression to rain on the lobster parade and pretty
much everything else. It was a luxury no one could afford.
So what happened. It went back to the canneries. A
(36:17):
protein source for soldiers during the World Wars from this
two thousand six Mother Jones article quote. In ninety four,
soldiers sat in foxholes in France eating lobster so strange
the lobster population was able to recover during this time.
In some places, during the Great Depression, particularly in Maine,
lobster was still viewed as a food for the poor.
(36:39):
Some lobster trappers might sneak up to a trap at
night to get the catchup lobster and reset the trap,
and then take those lobsters home that night to feed
their family. Children who went to school with lobster in
their sandwiches might be made fun of. The first documented
case of a lobster roll is from out of Milford, Connecticut.
(37:00):
It steamed lobster meat soaked in butter, served in a
warm hot dog bun with a side of chips or fries,
and it was pretty immediately but stay fairly local at first.
In nineteen sixty five, a Long Island became infatuated with
a lobster salad roll a sand which founded a restaurant
called the Lobster. In the seventies, roads stands in Maine
(37:23):
started serving lobster meat with butter and hot dog buns,
and the bun are bread was and usually still is
frequently toasted or grilled. During World War Two, a lobster
was not rationed, which meant folks from all walks were
discovering are perhaps rediscovering their love of lobster. It was
until the fifties that lobster started to move back into
(37:45):
that delicacy column, A food for celebrities, well off folks
served it at parties or at weddings. Between nineteen fifty
and nineteen seventy, over fishing drastically bumps up the price
until authorities stepped in to regulate it and things gradually
even back out. And then two four David Foster Wallace
(38:07):
published his peace Consider the Lobster. Uh. Yeah. This was
an essay originally appearing in Gourmet magazine that covered the
two thousand three Main Lobster Festival and is a perhaps
intriguing and also perhaps less than entirely scientific take on
on lobsters sentience. Yeah. It's available online if you want
to read it. Yeah. Climate change, modern le has been
(38:32):
changing lobster's habitat and behavior. Around the year two thousand,
the lobster fishing market in the in the southern More
parts of New England crashed. Um. They just weren't catching
enough to make do in rising ocean temperatures in the
Gulf of Maine causes lobster population to rise because they
dig warmish water and the price to plummet. But yeah,
(38:53):
the population is behaving a little bit strangely like it.
It makes sense that lobsters are migrating further north as
the previously two hold temperatures in the Gulf of Maine
start warming up a bit, and it makes sense that
they're thriving in this new environment. But um, But even
though the adults are thriving, the number of baby lobsters
in the Gulf of Maine has dropped by half in
the past decade. It's it's possible. Researchers think that shifting
(39:15):
wind and ocean currents may be pulling lobster larva out
out of the Gulf into the deeper water oh or
um or they might just be hatching further up north
now along the coast of Canada. A new study suggests
that over the next three decades, the lobster population in
the Gulf of Maine will shrink. Who that is a lot. Yeah. Uh.
(39:38):
In Switzerland and Italy both put laws in place requiring
crustaceans to be kept alive in like normal water conditions,
not on ice during transport and that they be stunned
before they're killed. And this brings us to today, and
are the recent hubbub about giving lobsters cannabis? What? Yes,
(40:00):
I have not heard of this, My goodness. What's up
with lobsters in cannabis? Well, it relates really well into
your size portion. But it was, you know, take the
edge off before boiling them. And I believe it was
a place in New York was starting to do it
and they've been asked by health officials to not do
(40:20):
it anymore. Um I okay, that's sure. Well it does
segue really nicely in your science, it does, it does. Um.
But but first we're gonna we're going to segue into
one more quick break for a word from our sponsor,
(40:48):
and we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you, And
we're back with a lobster science. So okay, the big one,
the big question is cooking lobsters alive cruel? The short
answer is that the science jury is still out. Um.
But but okay, let's let's go. Let's go through the
(41:09):
evidence and what people are thinking about. So uh. An
initial point of clarity here, lobsters do not have vocal
cords nor any other way of vocalizing. They do not bark. Um.
They can click their claws and legs together real good,
But like, that's it. So the sound that a lobster
makes when you drop it in a pot of boiling
water is not a scream. Um. It's most likely moisture
(41:32):
inside the shell coming to a boil and escaping a
steam under high pressure, like the like the whale of
a tea kettle. Yeah. Um. The problem here is that
the question of whether lobsters feel pain, and therefore whether
boiling them alive is cruel, is essentially unanswerable because it
ties into a larger unanswered question of how pain works. Um.
(41:56):
Because okay, the way that we humans experience pain is
super complex. For example, when we accidentally grab a hot pan,
it's it's not just that we're experiencing this negative stimulus,
we're we're also upset about it. The parts of our
nervous system that tell us, oh hot, hot, drop, drop
that thing, get away, um, and the ones that tell us, dang,
(42:19):
that is an injury do not damage it more. They're
both tied into other parts of our nervous system that
process emotion and memory. So we experienced the initial pain,
and we experience hurt a meaning pain not from the
original source, but rather from our body reminding us that
we've taken damage. Um, and we're like mad or sad
(42:41):
about it. And and further, being mad or sad about
it can make us experience pain and hurt more acutely,
especially with repeated exposure over the long term. So we
know that lobsters do experience that first part, that they'll
move away from a source of pain just like we will.
(43:02):
What we're not sure about is whether they experience those
other two, that the hurt and the emotion, because like
lobsters don't have brains the way that we consider them.
They do have a bunch of brainy bits that are
all tied together, but but they don't have a brain
that we that we consider it. Um. Studies have shown
that crustaceans will remember and avoid sources of pain, but
(43:24):
it's really hard to say whether that's a reflex or
something more complicated. If this is a thing that concerns you,
but you would still like to eat lobsters, sometimes you're
not alone. Um And yeah, there there are a couple
of practices that are considered more humane that some researchers
recommend other than pot Um, you can you can chill
(43:46):
or or ice down a lobster before you cook it,
and that can maybe put it into like a sort
of sleep state and let it go more gentle into
that good butter sauce. Um. The chilling has been shown
to reduce in pop movement from from six to ninety
seconds down to about twenty seconds um. And some restaurants
do employ a machine called a crustas doun which delivers
(44:10):
this strong electric shock to quickly kill shellfish before they're boiled.
Decapitation also works at that point. Wow, Yeah, I feel
like they've moved into something. In general, decapitation works pretty okay. Yeah,
except with hydra is a whole other episode. I'm unprepared
(44:36):
to talk about hydra. All return to that topic. Okay. Um,
Although all of this does beg the question, um, is
it even necessary to boil lobsters alive? Like? What impact
does alive versus dead versus frozen have on the consumers
experience of eating the lobster? And the answer here is
(44:59):
the it. The reason that lobsters are either transported live
or are cut into sections and frozen is because um,
parts of the lobster that we don't usually eat, like
the guts and the brain bits do spoil very much
faster than the meaty tail and claws, and will produce
um spoilage or the very best off flavors in in
(45:21):
the parts that we do eat. So like, you can't
really kill and fresh store lobsters the way that you
can shrimp or chicken. And I will say that the
texture of a fresh lobster is much nicer. The texture
and flavor is much nicer than that of previously frozen lobster.
So sciences looking into it, I suppose yeah, yeah, Like
(45:47):
I like, I've never I never liked lobster growing up.
I never got it. I never understood why people were
willing to pay so much for it, because I was like, this,
if the best part of this experience is the butter
that you dip it in, why are you just dipping
like bread or something else in butter? You can get
many things in butter that are less expensive. Um. And
then I went to a seaside town in Maine, and
(46:08):
I had a lobster roll that first of all, cost
like less than twenty five dollars, like perhaps seven and um,
seven dollars, and and was just so full of such fresh, tender,
delicious lobster. And I'm just like, oh, oh this is
the thing, this is what help welp. Yeah, it's funny
(46:32):
because I remember being at the fancy restaurant my life
read lobster, and I would never order the lobster because
that's too fit, that's too fancy. I couldn't go that far,
be ridiculous, right right, I'll take the chicken. Everyone will
judge me. I think I can eat lobster. I did
order lobster bis because even though I didn't realize this
(46:54):
was what Elaine was joking about in the time a
Sign Felt episode. But when she yatt a yachted sex
and Jerry said, you yatta yatta the best part, and
she said, I mentioned the lobster bis. So I was like, well,
I don't know what that means, but I'm gonna wear
And it was good. I mean it was just like
a ton of butter sure, yeah, cream, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Anyway,
(47:19):
I when I was researching this, something that came up
that I'm sure some people remember but I don't at all.
Is this whole question of whether or not lobsters can
write with a pen. Oh, there's a Snoop's article about it.
There's a video that went viral of a lobster seeming
(47:40):
to write, but Snopes broke it down and it seems
like it's an app and it was all a big trick.
Yep curses who was like, Convince, everyone loves just gonna write.
I don't know. I love it though, if it's a
slow like it's when you're an evil villain and you
got to start out small, star small, try different things, sticks,
(48:03):
work your way up to kidnapping and murder, learn about
human nature. Believe this lobster video, lobster can write, Okay,
make a note the Evil League of Evil will we'll
we'll take We'll take you. At that point, I think yeah.
Um other important question, do lobsters live forever? Um? Well,
(48:24):
the answered the answers now. Essentially, lobsters do not age
the way that we humans do. Given the right circumstances,
they don't stop growing and and they'll you know, continue
molting and growing for decades and they won't lose their
their strength or their cardiovascular health because it's not really
cardiovascular at that point. Um or their ability to reproduce
(48:44):
the way that we will researchers think that they do
eventually like run low on energy, maybe due to a
food supply and demand issue to keep them running at
those increasing sizes, or maybe they'll they'll get sick and
they won't be able to mold, like their shell will stick,
which leads to fatal complications. So they do die of
natural causes, just not the same natural causes that we
(49:06):
die of. Yeah yeah, because yeah uh, and lobster shells
are really cool. Um okay, so some some materials scientists
have been looking specifically at the shells of lobsters underbellies.
Um so, so the top, the top of lobster shells
(49:26):
in their claws are made of this very hard material.
It's fairly inflexible. It it'll it'll crack under pressure. You've
probably noticed that if you have ever deconstructed a lobster
to con assume um. But their bellies are are shelled
in with this more flexible stuff. It's made of kiton
but also like water, and it's constructed in these in
these micro layers sort of like a plywood or carbon fiber.
(49:50):
Each layer has fibers of kyton running through them and
and and each layers is offset from the last at
a slightly different angle, So the fibers run sort of
cross wise layer to layer, and and this is cool
for two reasons. First off, it means that if you
cut a gouge at the material, you're only going to
get through a few of these little micro layers before
(50:11):
the angle of the others start making it real hard
to keep going. Um. And second, the material can be
stretched to almost twice its length before it starts to
go stiff and get breakable. Uh. The researchers said, it's
it's as tough as the stuff that we used to make,
like garden hoses and conveyor belts and car tires. Wow.
Uh So I really hope that something based on this design,
(50:35):
or just something made out of lobster belly shell yeah,
comes out later. I love biomemetics. It's a really fascinating
field by memetics being a design based on biological systems.
I hope that, um, that car that looks like a
lobster was one day made out of that stuff, and
(50:55):
then you would really not want to run into that guy.
Oh man, it's like a tank hell exactly like that. Yes, yeah,
ideas lobster truck. I can't remember the name of lobster mania.
Uh yeah, so that's that's I think, that's what I think.
(51:17):
That's what I've got about lobsters. We got all have
to say about lobster Yeah, this is the longest episode
we've had in a minute, and I think we could
have kept going. Oh, I had to stop myself. As
as it is, I think I went on too long.
I did not get my other homework done for the day.
But um, you gotta consider it. You gotta consider the
(51:39):
lobster Well, this brings us to norm that sounds Widberg makes.
Oh I can't. I can't reproduce it personally. Where I
gotta add it through my is some impressions ever growing
(52:04):
and not. I'm not marking anything off perfect. Yes, all right,
Samantha wrote, I'm currently binging the show a bit to
catch up, back up, since I fell behind. I'm on
the chocolate chip cookie episode. Since I still had the
natilla episode in the brain, I thought i'd share with
you wonderful, delicious concoction. My husband came up with fun
(52:25):
fetty natle cookies. Yes, it's as good as it sounds.
He freezes small dabs and to tell us so that
they're solid enough to handle, then makes the fun fetty
cake mix into cookie mix, and each cookie he stuffs
in a tell ball, totally encasing it in the cookie dough.
The result is a delicious cookie with melty, delicious Natalia inside.
(52:46):
I'm sure it would work with other sugar cookie variations,
but it's more fun with fun. I mean it's in
the name. It's so delightful. I've done that once with
like a cupcake and I put cookie, don't want the cupcake,
but I've never done this. Yeah, experiments excellent, Allen wrote,
(53:08):
I would like to make a few observations after after
listening to your recent podcast on m R E s.
I speak from over forty two years of eating field
rations in one sort or another, from cans to the
modern iterations of US and Canadian rations. Along the way,
I've had a chance to try British, German and French rations.
The first thing to say is that today's m R.
E s are vastly improved over the old canned rations.
(53:31):
Ham and egg, omelet and chicken bits in a slimy
gelatine come to mind. The second point I would like
to make is that means of heating them have also varied.
Early rations had hexamine heating tablets, which gave most of
the food a unique chemical taste. The meal pouches have
also been heated on top of lights and office trailers,
(53:51):
or on top of engine manifolds. Some were riskier than
other methods. A preferred method was a pot of boiling
water or a pressure cooker. The modern self heating pouch
has done away with much of the uncertainty about heating
the meals. However, an awful lot of them are eaten cold.
As great as the modern rations are and the variety available,
(54:11):
it still doesn't preclude with an outpost getting a few
weeks of rations with a couple of meal choices. Imagine
three meals a day with the same menu for a
couple of weeks. Even poached salmon will be tiresome. Ah yeah, yeah, yeah,
I can imagine, I can I can see that. Oh absolutely,
(54:33):
And variety, y'all. It's delicious. It's important. It is important.
I've been really appreciating everybody who wrote in about their
m e oh goodness mm hmmmmmm. So expect some more
of those over the coming weeks. But in the meantime
we would like to thank both of them for writing
in and if you would like to write to us,
(54:53):
you can yeah. Our email is Hello at saborpod dot com.
We're also on social media. You can find us on
s book, Twitter, and Instagram at savor Pod. We do
hope to hear from you. Savor is a production of
I Heart Radio and Stuff Media. For more podcasts from
my heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thanks as
(55:15):
always to our super producers Andrew Howard and Dylan Pagan.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way
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