Simply Grilled Lobster Tails

paula

10 years ago

Looking for something different than burgers and hot dogs to grill for that backyard get together? Grilled lobster tails are a surprisingly simple and budget-friendly choice.

In fact, with sales and coupons at Earth Fare recently, grilled lobster tails have almost became common place at our house 😉

I must admit that I wasn’t sure about grilling lobster tails the first time I bought frozen tails…on sale of course. The ones I had eaten in restaurants were often dry, rubbery, and did not taste much like lobster…actually they did not have much taste period. I did notice that most of them were completely split down the middle with grill marks on the meat. Thus, I knew that was not the way I wanted to grill them.

After a lot of research, I found that that many people liked the butter poached method developed by Thomas Keller. While butter poaching sounds delicious, it did not give me that smoky grilled taste. I also read about a method of first boiling and then grilling the lobster. The lobster would have that grilled taste, but it would lack the rich, moister of the the butter. Thus, I decided to sort of combine the two.

Unlike the butter poaching method, I decided to use clarified butter before in the lobster tails before placing them on the grill. Clarified butter is much less likely to burn with the heat of the grill.

Unsalted butter can be clarified by heating in a heavy pan on the stove or in the microwave until it stops producing more foam, skimming the foam from the top, and using the gold liquid underneath, but leaving the white sediment on the bottom. You can use cheesecloth to strain the remaining liquid after removing the foam, if you really want to make sure all of the milk solids are removed.

I do have one caveat: soak all of your skewers in water prior to boiling and grilling to avoid having one of them catch of fire…like I did.

Recipe: Grilled Lobster Tails

Ingredients:

3 to 4 oz. lobster tails
1/2 c. butter, clarified
skewers
salted boiling water

Instructions:

If using frozen lobster tails, defrost them in the refrigerator overnight.
If using wooden skewers, soak them in water for an hour before preparing the lobster.
Rinse lobster tails, if desired.
Use kitchen shears to cut down the middle of the underneath side of the tail.
Run the skewer down the center to the end of the lobster tail. This makes them easier to handle and prevents them from curling.
Place the lobster in salted boiling water for 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. If lobster tail is 5 – 6 oz., increase time in water to 2 to 2 1/2 minutes. (The lobster tails will not/should not be completely cooked).
With tails on their uncut top side, separate the split underside enough to pour clarified butter in each of the shells.
Keeping the split sides up, place the lobster tails on a grill over medium heat.
Grill for about 2 minutes until the lobster meat is mostly opaque.
Turn over to place the split side down on the grill for 30 to 60 seconds until lobster meat is opaque and the internal temperature is 145 degrees when measured with an instant read thermometer. DO NOT OVER COOK!
Serve with remaining (or additional) clarified butter.

I am honored to have been asked by Earth Fare to write this post in exchange for a gift card toward buying the ingredients. I love shopping at Earth Fare not only because of the great quality of food, but because they offer such great deals and coupon, They did not ask me to share my opinion; it is my own. You can find all the ingredients for this recipe at Earth Fare.