Houston Blog

Photos by Robb Walsh

​As we reported previously, there is a glut of cheap lobster on the market. Last Thursday, I took advantage of the weak market by picking up three sea monsters for a dinner party. The prices at Hong Kong Supermarket in Bellaire Chinatown were $8.99 a pound for big lobsters, and $6.99 for small one-clawed lobsters. (That's a long way down from the $12.99 we usually pay in Houston.) I bought a five-pounder and two three-pounders.

Eating whole lobsters gets pretty messy. And some diners who aren't veteran lobster eaters get intimidated by the claw-cracking and body-ripping thing. So I figured I needed to make a lobster dish that was easy to eat. Boulibasse was my first thought since I got a lot of top quality Spanish saffron a while back and I wanted to use it up before it dried out.

​But then I remembered the Yankee spin on shrimp grits I had at Jonathan's the Rub -- he substituted succulent giant New England scallops for the Gulf shrimp. So why not lobster grits? I made the grits with lots of onions, celery, and peppers. And I added a large dose of butter and lots of Spanish saffron. It was a wildly rich dish that went exceptionally well with the orange label Clicquot we were drinking.