15 Feb Grilled lobster with chilli garlic oil and roasted leek
Grilled lobster with chilli garlic oil and roasted leek This is a beautiful and simple lobster recipe, a perfect example of what the South African braai can add in flavour. The subtle woody flavours of the braai are phenomenal on lobster meat.
Ingredients
2 large lobsters
1 red pepper
2 garlic cloves
250 ml sunflower oil
Half a bunch of curly parsley
2 large leeks
Half a lemon
Freshly-ground pepper and salt
Also required
Satay skewers
Perforated grill plate
A saucepan
Preparation:
- Pour the sunflower oil into a saucepan (with a steel handle!) and add a pinch of salt. Remove the seeds from the red pepper and slice the pepper into thin rings. Finely chop the garlic cloves and add both ingredients to the sunflower oil. Heat the oil very gently over the grill and leave to stand for half an hour,
- Pierce the lobsters through the head in one swift movement with a sharp knife. Place the lobsters in a large pan of boiling water and cook for exactly 2 minutes. Remove the lobsters from the pan, leave to cool for a few moments and separate the head from the tail by twisting the tail and head in opposite directions. Remove the legs from the lobster and break open the claws. The easiest way is to tap the claws a few times with the back of a knife. Then break open the shell as if peeling an egg.
- Place the claw meat on a greased, perforated grill plate. Discard the heads and legs or save them for something else. Lay the lobsters on their backs and use a pair of poultry scissors to cut the shell off the belly side so that the meat is completely exposed. Insert a skewer into the tails, along the top of the shell so that the tails don’t curl up.
- Make sure that a good glowing bed of coals is spread out and put the leeks directly into the hot coals. Turn them over after a few minutes, ensuring that all sides are nicely blackened. Remove the leeks from the coals and leave to rest.
- Place the lobsters on the grill and grill them for two minutes per side. Start with the shell down, then the flesh side. For the last two minutes, place the grill plate with the meat side of the claws on the grill and turn the claws after one minute. Meanwhile, remove the outer layer from the leeks and slice the leeks into thin rings.
- Remove everything from the braai and place on a plate. Drizzle the lobsters and the claws with the chilli garlic oil and sprinkle with some finely-chopped parsley and the roasted leek rings. Squeeze half a lemon over the lobster meat and finally sprinkle with some freshly-ground black pepper and salt!