I'm not a wine drinker, so I can't help you there, I'm only guessing something white.

I'd buy lobster tails and stick them in the oven, way easier than boiling or steaming them. While I had the oven on I'd probably roast some asparagus as a vegetable, I love it.

Sauce for lobster? Not at all necessary in my opinion, just some nice melted butter on the side for dipping.

Plate color. Hmmmm. What color do you have? I'd say nearly any color is OK, but red with the red lobster and green asparagus could look a bit like Christmas. I'm not sure I'd go with blue either, white would be fine if you have it. Of course, I just like white. (grin)

Good luck, lobster would impress me!

Annie

Thx Annie,

I forgot to say I would also like to take the meat "ready to go" from the shell (Sorry, English is far from being my native language.) so that it would not be difficult to extract the meat from the shell while eating, avoiding exploding cracks and flying food all over the place :-)

It there a way to break/cut the shell cleanly so that it still looks like a lobster when it is on the plate ?

I don't know that there's a way to break a whole lobster cleanly but when I'm doing just tails I split it up the middle (bottom) with my kitchen shears all the way to the tail flippers and kind of pull the edges apart. That frees that big piece of meat for easy removal and then it can be cut into pieces for dipping or eating.

Elery says he'd serve a kind of fruity Chardonnay and that the "wine guy" should be able to help you. However, he likes dry whites, so I say drink whatever you (or she) likes. Heck, I'm a heathen, I'd drink Moscato!

Annie

Welcome Phil! We love these "meals to impress" threads don't we!

I love lobster. Just melted butter with maybe a squeeze of fresh lemon juice for dipping is the best sauce. Whatever green veggie she likes--some don't like asparagus, but if she does, it's impre$$ive. As for color, a salad with mixed colored greens--maroon lettuce or raddichio for color, mixed colored peppers, shredded carrots, sliced hard boiled eggs . . . lots of options. One salad I like (although she may not) is sliced pickled beets on romaine, (with optional thinly sliced fennel or celery), crumbled feta or blue cheese, whatever type of dressing you like, and topped with toasted sunflower seeds or walnuts. It turns pink when you toss it! Can you tell I would like that? ;)

Here are my suggestions for an "easy and good" dinner.

Thaw lobster tails and cut down the center of the underside shell. Don't cut all the way through the meat, just half way. Remove meat from shell. Flatten meat by pressing with your hand. Cook the lobster in a hot skillet with butter and a splash of olive oil. When lobster is opaque white, about 4 minutes, remove it to a warm plate. Squeeze some fresh lemon juice into the pan and stir it briefly. Spoon some of the lemon butter sauce over the lobster. If this seems complicated, it is not. I just wanted to include all details for clarity.

For color on the plate, a green vegetable is nice. Microwave a package or frozen spinach or peas in a bowl covered with a saucer, following package instructions. Dress with a dab of butter and season with salt before plating. Have the vegetable can be ready to cook so you can just press the start button at the appropriate time. You want it to finish cooking just when you are ready to plate it.

Buy one of those small boxes of couscous and prepare it per package instructions. It takes 5 minutes and very little attention. The couscous will keep warm in the pot for several minutes.

A salad can rise above the ordinary with a bit of care. Buy hearts of romaine. Wash and *dry* the leaves by patting them with paper towels. Chop the leaves. Coat the *dried* lettuce with bottled caesar dressing by mixing it in a large bowl before placing it in individual salad bowls or plates. Sprinkle with shredded cheese (pre-shredded from the store) and top with purchased croutons. Get lettuce ready ahead of time but don't put the salad together until a few minutes before serving so it won't get soggy. Again, nothing difficult, just attention to detail.

Plate the couscous, lobster and vegetable on warm plates.

A well chilled dry white wine would be best. Pinot grigio seems to suit many peoples' taste.

Good luck. I hope you both enoy the meal. It will be candle lit, won't it? And there will be fresh flowers on the table?

Jim

I wish these messages could be edited. That sentence should read "Have the vegetable ready to cook so you can just press the start button at the appropriate time."

Jim

Save yourself by taking her to a restaurant.

: )
lyra

I pretty well agree with Jim.....but....you could also remove the meat from the shell and cut into "medallions" circkes about 1/2 an unch thick, then fry the medallions in a little butter until just opaque....about 3 minutes at most/ Then add some squeezed fresh lemon to the pan and stir....add a little chopped parsley,s tir and pour over the lobster medallions on a surving platter....surround with your cooked asparagus and mounds of the couscous....
Open the bottle of champaigne ande njoy.
for Champagne I would get a Frixinet....the stuff in the black bottle, about $12 a bottle....or you could get a bottle of Prosecco....which is an Italian sparkling wine....very nice.
Linda C

Eating frozen lobster tails is like eating a large rubber band...if you try to cook from frozen it's hard not to overcook & if you allow them to thaw for even 30 minutes they get mushy. Do you have a fish department in your local grocery store? Do they have a live lobster tank? If so, ask the guy behind the counter to please cook two for you. It'll cost a bit more; but dinner will be much better & you'll have extra lobster meat for another meal. Then, when you get home all you'll need to do is quickly hit the already cooked tails in a skillet with some melted butter just to warm. Ask the guy to save the shells for your presentation. (Believe me, they are used to this & do it all the time.)

Serve with whatever you want...lots of good ideas here. I'm from New England though & those frozen lobster tails are not good. Even when I lived in Denver my grocery store would gladly cook the live lobsters for me.

/tricia

Here you go. If you cut down the top of the shell to the little fin in the back and then pull the lobster meat on top of the shell (without ripping it totally away from the shell), you can broil it for just a few minutes, maybe brush with a little melted butter mixed with some chopped fresh herbs.

Serve with a little more of the melted butter and mixed herbs if you like. I finished the plate with some broccoli (I sauteed some shallots & pine nuts to go over the veg), and some basmati rice. Garnish the plate with lemon wedges, and you're good to go.

I like a nice Riesling to go with lobster.

Enjoy!

Lori :-D

Well I'm in agreement with Tricia. I'm fortunate that I live where I have access to lots of seafood but so are many others. Where do you live? Do you have access to Costco or BJ's? Do you have access to a grocer with lobster tanks?

Making a lobster pasta dish similar to Shrimp Scampi w/pasta is easy and very quick. Pasta and the sauce cooks very quickly. Just serve a nice salad and crusty bread/butter along side along with the nice wine. You could cook up the lobster meat in no time and remove from the shell and add to the pasta dish just to heat back up (and it would take a minute or two). You don't want to over cook lobster - tough, rubber as Tricia said. And as Tricia said, most grocers will cook the lobster for you (in my area for free) and there you have it done and just add to the pasta dish at the final end of making the sauce.

I also agree with her presentation - save a few claws and put those on the plate along side. It looks very nice.

The OP lives in Mexico....I don't think there's a prayer that he can get "northern lobster" in any store. But I am sure that he can buy langouiste or rock lobster easily.
And Tricia, I disagree...I have had nice frozen lobster...of course that's the only kind I can get easily here. Yeah lots of stores have "lobster tanks" but I would rather fresh frozen than sluggish fresh.
Also I don't like a sweet wine with lobster....no reisling. no rose but a pinot grigio would be nice or a really really dry chablis.
Do you get Chilean wines? Australian? Argentinean? Lovely stuff!
Set a lovely table......gently cook some lobster..... add a simple butter and lemon and serve it with a risotto or rice or vegetable of choice...
And since most of what you are serving, except the green vegetable is pale in color, how about a deep green plate? or a plate the color of the inside of a mango?
And chocolate! Don't forget the chocolate!!

I can't disagree with any of the comments above. It's just that Phil has some specific requirements which I think can be met nicely with his idea. And yes, it is essential that the lobster tail meat must be cooked just to doneness and no more.

I live a few steps from a good fish market on Cape Cod and my favorite way of having lobster is to get a big one, large enough to serve the bunch of us. The market has it steamed and ready for us to pick up at a designated time. Some go for the tail, which is my last choice, but may be right for the meal Phil is planning. (I did NOT mean that as a straight line for Jessie.) With a large enough lobster, I can be more than happy with just the tasty white fat, the green liver, the bits found around the leg joints and the red roe if it's a female. I will sneak a bit of the claw meat too, if possible. It's the best part. But this is messy business. It's not what Phil probably wants for this occasion. Also, what experienced cooks think of as routine are not easily accomplished in his situation and, as we know, timing can get complicated.

Lori, that is a lovely, scrumptious looking plate. I had thought of Riesling too. It would work well.

Linda's idea of champagne is perfect. You can't go wrong with the bubbly. It's good with anything and everybody likes it. Why didn't I think of that? Lobster tail medallions are a good idea too. Cook them *briefly*.

Jim

Thanks, Jim!

Not all Rieslings are sweet (just learned that last year). But I'm not sure how much of a variety of wines the OP has available. A sparkling wine or champagne might be the best choice in the interest of ease in decision-making!

Lori :-D

I've had frozen lobster tails all my life and never found it mushy. I've found it delicious.

As for the lobster meals, Jim has hit the nail on the head--if you're cooking a meal to impress and you're no gourmet cook--keep it simple! You want the focus to be on having a nice time together, not fussing in the kitchen. That meal sounds fab to me! BTW, I rarely follow my own advice so I've learned this lesson the hard way.

Like Lpink, I've also eaten frozen lobster tails my whole life. Here in Michigan we don't have lobsters and it's only been in the last several years that you see the tanks with live lobsters.

I have eaten lobster in Maine several times, I'm only assuming it was "fresh" because it came to me whole on a plate at various places up and down the coast. I spent two vacations there, two weeks each time, and had lobster at least half a dozen times each vacation, LOL.

IMO the frozen lobster tails are better than the ones I find in a tank here and not appreciably worse than the fresh ones. If I wanted to fly in some fresh Maine lobster at a zillion dollars each, they would be better I'm sure, but here it's frozen lobster tails or nothing.

Since the lobster is neither whole nor alive, I don't try to boil them, they always go into the oven. I don't broil them since the broiler on my oven is the worst design ever and I have to lie on my stomach on the floor to get stuff in and out, LOL.

So, Phil, what's for dessert? Chocolate dipped strawberries to go with the "red" theme? Maybe Dishesdone's lemon cakes, those would be yummy.

As for the wine, I told you I like the sweet stuff. I had a late harvest Riesling that I liked a lot, but Elery thought was too sweet. It's all in what you like, I think.

So, have you decided yet? And when's dinner?

Annie

I assure all of you that I have eaten frozen lobster tails many times in my life. I was just saying that if they did have the option of getting fresh that it would be nice. I didn't know where they lived (have only been coming to this board since 2007 and am not familiar with a lot of people).

I agree with all...the more simple, the better as they stated that they weren't a good cook but I think a lot of people are better cooks then what they give themselves credit for.

I ate a lot of fresh lobster when living in Maine. Boy do I miss those days.

I've only tried making frozen tails twice that I recall, and both times I found the texture around where it was broken off the body to be very odd. Almost plasticky or something. Bad enough to where the first 1.5 inches or so was cut off and thrown out. And I'm not talking just tough and overcooked. It was probably just just "user error", but has anyone else experienced this? I don't recall how I cooked it the first time, but second time the meat was pulled out of the shell and baked on top of the shell.

Jim - I'll have a lobster feast with you any day. You can have all the claws if I can have all the tails!

You guys are absolutely amazing.

I am going to print this thread, and read it quietly a few dozen times. I will have to go for a frozen tail. Another naive question : is there a way to find out if a frozen lobster was fresh when being frozen (eyes color, etc...).

I may buy some and cook it for trying before.

Btw, I stumbled on a site called www.lobsterhelp.com. There are some good pics on how to cut lobster.

Thanks again !

Phil

My only warning Phil: If a girl sees a man preparing lobster and serving sparkling wine she may think a small box might be coming for desert. Every guy should have a dinner 'specialty' but outta-no-where-lobster gives off a 'proposal' vibe. Be careful as you proceed don't hurt you or her.

Thx for the warning Sands99 :- )