Spaghetti with Lobster Sauce

Spaghetti with Lobster Sauce Recipe by Tim Lane

For years, Tim supervised the food preparation for the Essex Firemen’s annual spaghetti suppers. But while ladle and spoon were essential to its making, his much-praised sauce owed even more to the existence of the fork. It all began with the tomato, of course, which arrived in Italy in the mid-1500s and took a good century to make its way into a sauce. Surprisingly, it then took another hundred years before tomato sauce found its way onto a plate of spaghetti, which had been eaten with one’s fingers since its creation in 12th-century Sicily.

Uncommon in Europe, where the Vatican had derided its usage, it was only when Italian nobility discovered how well a fork could twirl spaghetti that it gradually became accepted in certain circles. Because it also enabled one to eat and keep one’s fingers clean, the fork triggered the invention of spaghetti sauce, which led to the fork’s acceptance by Italy’s common classes, and its eventual usage throughout the Western Hemisphere in the 18th century. This included the hardy souls manning the bucket brigades of Chebacco Parish, now known as Essex, where Tim Lane, who worked out in front of the Restaurant selling lobsters as a teen, now presents this recipe in the finest spaghetti tradition of cause and delicious effect.

Spaghetti with Lobster Ingredients

1 tablespoon garlic, chopped

1 tablespoon fresh basil, chopped

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 28-ounce can Pinecone whole tomatoes (or your favorite brand)

5 1¼-pound lobsters

Pasta of choice (1 pound)

How to Make Spaghetti with Lobster Sauce

In a large skillet, preheat olive oil, and sauté garlic and basil until wilted. Add the tomatoes and simmer slowly for an hour. Break apart the tails and claws of the lobsters, keeping the lobster meat in the shells. Add to the tomato mixture and cook slowly for 2 hours. Cook the pasta separately and drain. Pour the tomato sauce and lobster (still in the shell) over the pasta. Serves 5.

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