What The Swiss...

[Kitchen]

As someone who grow up in restaurants and almost went to culinary school, this article really cracks me up. 

Switzerland Bans Boiling ...

Are their really enough people out there who feel so sorry for crustaceans they work to outlaw boiling them.  Give me a break. 

[Islandboy]

Wow. Enforcement will be interesting.

[cigaraholic]

Sounds like the Jack Daniels law......lobsters must be dead drunk before boiling...I’ve been doing that for years ?

[oliverdst]

It will never sound right to me boil an alive being.

[cigcars]

    Well BRAVO to the Swiss! I agree 10,000% of not causing needless suffering to any living thing. I'd heard everything from putting the lobster into the pot head first, which should kill the sensory nerves and so on. But the other methods, I can appreciate the tried use of. Thanks for the article, Joe, even if you don't agree with them.

[Kitchen]

The problem here is that living things start to decay much faster after death then what we think.  Now, in many cases, eating something soon after death is not too bad, but crustaceans are bottom feeders have more bacteria, viruses and parasites.  Crustaceans start to develop toxins very quickly after death, which is why we keep them alive, or individually quick freeze them alive and keep them frozen, until we are ready to eat them. 

Cruel or not, I would rather eat a lobster freshly killed then one that may have been dead for a bit.  I fear this will only make people think it is okay to eat a crustaceans if it has been dead. 

[cigcars]

35 minutes ago, JoeKitchen said:

The problem here is that living things start to decay much faster after death then what we think.  Now, in many cases, eating something soon after death is not too bad, but crustaceans are bottom feeders have more bacteria, viruses and parasites.  Crustaceans start to develop toxins very quickly after death, which is why we keep them alive, or individually quick freeze them alive and keep them frozen, until we are ready to eat them. 

Cure or not, I would rather eat a lobster freshly killed then one that may have been dead for a bit.  I fear this will only make people think it is okay to eat a crustaceans if it has been dead. 

     *Isn't this why they and other fish & seafood animals are kept on ice?

[Kitchen]

2 minutes ago, cigcars said:

     *Isn't this why they and other fish & seafood animals are kept on ice?

Yes, but crustaceans can still start to decay to point of being unsafe to eat even on ice.  They're bottom feeders. 

When I worked in the industry, we would never serve dead clams or oysters that died while on ice.  It's just not safe. 

[Colt45]

1 hour ago, JoeKitchen said:

Cruel or not, I would rather eat a lobster freshly killed then one that may have been dead for a bit. 

I read the issue as boiling them alive - that they could be dispatched more "humanely" immediately prior to cooking.

[Kitchen]

12 minutes ago, Colt45 said:

I read the issue as boiling them alive - that they could be dispatched more "humanely" immediately prior to cooking.

Saw that, and, well, for someone who cant stomach dropping a lobster in boiling water I find it unlikely they could stomach killing it in their more humane way.

We use to serve two types of lobsters, stemmed and stuffed.  When stuffed, we would stab the lobster in the head, as described, and then thrust the rest of the knife down and through the body cavity and tail.  Afterwards, we would crack the lobster in half, with still moving muscles, and wash out the organs.  At this point, the lobster was completely dead, but the fact that the organs and muscles still twitched really freaked people out to point where one guy had to leave the kitchen every time.  He was always perfectly fine with dropping it into boiling water though. 

Like I said, I fear this will only give people reason to cook and eat already dead lobsters, which is very unsafe. 

[Kitchen]

24 minutes ago, cigcars said:

      OOOOkay, I hear ya - !

If you want to make fun, fine, but this just shows you know little about preparing shellfish.  Ask any chef, you should never cook and eat already dead shellfish regardless of how long they have been dead or where they died. 

[foursite12]

Heat from cooking process doesn't kill the bad bugs?

[Andy04]

The humane way is placing the live lobster into a freezer for between 1-2 hours, then boil.  Exposing them to freezing temperatures will render the lobster to become unconscious.

All the best with enforcement!

[cigcars]

51 minutes ago, JoeKitchen said:

If you want to make fun, fine, but this just shows you know little about preparing shellfish.  Ask any chef, you should never cook and eat already dead shellfish regardless of how long they have been dead or where they died. 

     HEY- did you hear me mocking you or something???? I was AGREEING with you. AND I don't even eat shellfish anymore anyway due to the dangerous levels of Mercury and other chemicals in our waterways now. And, no I WASN'T making fun of you.

[GotaCohiba]

Send all the live lobster to me and I will dispose of them humanely

 

 

[GotaCohiba]

If boiling lobster is a problem for them, how do they eat any meat products?

[...]

35 minutes ago, cigcars said:

     HEY- did you hear me mocking you or something???? I was AGREEING with you. AND I don't even eat shellfish anymore anyway due to the dangerous levels of Mercury and other chemicals in our waterways now. And, no I WASN'T making fun of you.

Yeah, quite a few buthurt folks on the forum lately... must be a cycle thing...

[Engineer99]

Keep 'em alive and two seconds before the boiling water, stick a knife between it's eyes. Problem solved.

[PapaDisco]

Is this just us amthropormorphosizing lobsters?  Is there evidence they can feel the same temperature ranges that we can?

And, just to be fair, I believe the lobster, if big enough, would think nothing of snipping us in two and eating us alive or dead.  We're still part of the animal kingdom whether we like it or not. 

[Kitchen]

11 hours ago, cigcars said:

     HEY- did you hear me mocking you or something???? I was AGREEING with you. AND I don't even eat shellfish anymore anyway due to the dangerous levels of Mercury and other chemicals in our waterways now. And, no I WASN'T making fun of you.

If you meant no harm, sorry.  It's just that when I hear someone pronounce OOOkay, accenting the O like you spelled, it is usually meant as a mock. 

[Kitchen]

11 hours ago, foursite12 said:

Heat from cooking process doesn't kill the bad bugs?

Yes, but if the toxins are already released it does not matter.  Toxins are not living things, they are just chemicals. 

[oliverdst]

12 hours ago, JoeKitchen said:

Saw that, and, well, for someone who cant stomach dropping a lobster in boiling water I find it unlikely they could stomach killing it in their more humane way.

We use to serve two types of lobsters, stemmed and stuffed.  When stuffed, we would stab the lobster in the head, as described, and then thrust the rest of the knife down and through the body cavity and tail.  Afterwards, we would crack the lobster in half, with still moving muscles, and wash out the organs.  At this point, the lobster was completely dead, but the fact that the organs and muscles still twitched really freaked people out to point where one guy had to leave the kitchen every time.  He was always perfectly fine with dropping it into boiling water though. 

Like I said, I fear this will only give people reason to cook and eat already dead lobsters, which is very unsafe. 

aparently who doesn´t have stomach it´s you

[Cep]

Maybe we should stop eating things that live and breathe and have a brain 

Maybe not though.  

Honestly i dont care what i eat as long as someone prepares it for me. 

[Santiago]

Restaurants will still have to be responsible for the safety and quality of their shellfish, so I don’t see a downside here. I wouldn’t go out of my way to do this when cooking at home though. 

[HarveyBoulevard]