Lobster no longer a splash-out as record harvests crack high prices Local prices at the seaside this summer are as low as $5 a pound Summertime, at its very best, announces itself in little rituals: the sprint down the beach to feel the ocean hit your toes, the beer yanked from an ice-filled cooler. Up and down the New England coast, the first lobster of the season emerges steaming from an aluminum pot and is served with a little cup of drawn butter, a plastic bib and a fistful of moist towelettes. Then there is the second lobster, likely tossed in butter and mayonnaise and piled on a toasted roll. The third one might arrive by way of a creamy bisque. By then, most of us have come to the end of our lobster repertoires. We’re out of steam. Lobster might be the ultimate totem of the seaside experience. Though it looms large in the summer vacationer’s imagination, it has traditionally been pigeonholed into a tediously narrow range of preparations. This is a shame, because lobster has so much to recommend it. It’s sustainable, for one, in an ocean full of creatures being fished toward extinction. It’s lean. It has also, in recent years, become a bargain. The cost of meats, fish, poultry and eggs has risen, overall, by almost 8% in the past year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, but lobster is getting more affordable. Thanks to a glut of so-called soft-shell lobsters—the delicate specimens in new shells caught off the coast of Maine in the summer months—the past three seasons have delivered deals for anyone buying close to the source. Consumers at the seaside this summer are finding local prices as low as $5 a pound, as much as 50% below where they were a decade ago.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 11:43:36 +0000
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